Posted on 09/09/2007 10:23:28 AM PDT by looois
Judge: Truant kids’ parents face jail
ASSOCIATED PRESS
PENSACOLA — Parents of kids who habitually skip school could find themselves locked up under an aggressive plan to curb truancy in this Florida Panhandle community.
Parents who ignore several warnings and offers of help will have to explain to a judge why they shouldn’t face jail time for misdemeanor charges. Escambia County school officials worked with Circuit Judge Ross Goodman to toughen the consequences.
“If the parent is not sending the child to school, then I can send the parent to jail,” Goodman said.
School officials said 177 of the district’s roughly 40,000 students already have missed at least five days in the first two weeks of school.
Read more http://www.flatoday.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070909/BREAKINGNEWS/70909011/1086
(Excerpt) Read more at flatoday.com ...
Er...and if the parents are in jail, what will the kids be up to?
So are they allowed to use physical force to get their children to school? Or will they be arrested for that, too?
I think the justice department is way smarter than the rest of us. They probably stagger the jail terms. Pop goes to prison for the first few days and then it is Mom's turn...
Is it still legal for parents to spank the kid?
While I applaud "get tough" attitudes regarding slovenly parents who send their kids to public school and don't care if they skip.......
I worry about some judge trying to use truancy laws against homeschoolers. The judge doesn't have to adhere to the homeschool laws, they don't adhere to other laws anymore. They just find a case where they can push their agenda despite the law; anti-homeschool so the schools can indoctrinate all children uniformly.
choices:
1. Work to support myself and try and deal with an out of control teenager
OR
2. Get free room and board, a well deserved break from the stress of parenting an out of control teen and let the state take over handling the out of control teen
Um, Judge. I think I’ll take door number 2 and let me know how it turns out for you and my kid
What about the situations where good parents end up with bad kids? In general a kid raised by good parents will end up being a solid kid but that isn’t always the case. We all know kids from good homes who become goons or even criminals.
Well, I guess I would have spent most of my kids school years being locked up under this plan. As a single parent dealing with my oldest boy, he would continually fight me about going to school. Now mind you I had a choice be at work at 5:30 AM or be home way late in the evening. I chose to be home with my kids in the evening when they needed me the most.
Under this plan I would have had to turn my oldest boy over to the state so I would stay out of jail.
So my feelings on this are simple. It’s a good weapon to have in the legal arsenal. But one size does not fit all people.
Probably the result of this is that even more kids will drop out of the school system. Thereby removing their taint from the scores of the schools.
Yeah, I was thinking this could cause home schoolers some grief, esp if a judge is against or doesn’t understand home-schooling. Also money is involved here. Would there be such a will to get kids in school if the schools were paid a flat rate per student, regardless of attendence? I can see schools getting really aggressive. Will parents send sick kids to school, in fear of getting arrested now?
I'd kind of like to see a few social service bureaucrats get thrown in jail when kids misbehave. They seem to claim total authority over them a lot.
When I was a teenager I would skip school. There was just such a wonderful world waiting to be explored and sitting at a desk inside all day was torture. My mom tried to make me go. The school tried to make me go. They finally left me alone because when they forced me I made them miserable. Some kids just have to get their education the hard way. Now if my Dad had been living with us I might have straightened up. I wonder how many of these Moms are single parents, working and doing the best they can.
That may be naive.
It seems like that 95% of these cases are uneducated working single mothers with hulking teenage sons. The boy sees no reason to pay any attention to what his mother says, and in any case she’s at work, not at home.
“Circuit Judge Ross Goodman gets it”
I agree, but he would do better just by taking the children into state custody.
The concept of "Dad (or Mom) could lose his job if put in jail and we'd all be in the street...which would inhibit our food rations and entertainment expenses", doesn't occur to them either.
Wouldn’t it be better to tell the kid to get a job (at McD’s for instance) instead of this? Don’t get a job? THEN go to jail.
And I'm afraid you missed the point entirely here. The judge obviously is placing the blame for truant kids on the parent(s). If the parent CANNOT accept responsibility of taking care of the kid, the court will take steps to MAKE it your responsibility.
Good lord, you make it sound like someone under the age of 18 can do anything they want! I certainly hope you don't or will never have kids because you obviously feel that inmates (hulking teenager sons) run the home...
What if the parents are home schooling?
How many of these teenagers would be better served by GEDs and apprenticeships, instead of being ordered to sit in a classroom until they drop out?
I’m all for that. If you have a teenager that doesn’t want
to be in school, then you are wasting your time making them
stay IMO. The military used to be an option.
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