Old laws... useful today...

[MissJacksonCA]

Apparently there's an old law on the books here in SC that says parents can be charged $50 dollars for each day each of their children is absent from school without an excuse... I think its great ... they're trying to re-vamp the law and use it apparently there's a lot of truancy going on here... On the one side... my mom prolly woulda owed my school several hundred dollars because I skipped a bit when I lived with her ... but ... there's some parents who dont have health insurance and can't always afford to send their kids to the doctor/dentist/whatever ... or they can't afford to take time off work to take them to the doctor or what-have-you so ultimately i'm just not sure if its a good or a bad thing... whudduya think?

[AcesandEights]

Woah...in what state or school district do they require doctor's notes for a day here or there off from school for the kid? In my day, if you were sick, a parent wrote a note and that was that. Doctor's need not enter the picture unless the kid has something that would require professional attention or the kid is out for an extended absence of some sort. Anyway, gotta be leary of them old laws 'still on the books.' This one might not be so bad, however...

[Yojimbo]

I like those laws which force parents into forcing their kids to go to school. Yeah, in my day too there was little the school district could do in this regard, and a note from the parents was all that was needed, and most of the time not even that much. My folks would have owed a lot of money back then cause, like MJ, I played hooky too. Screw the kids who don't care about education and their lame ass parents who don't care about their kids. In Los Angeles, you can be thrown in jail if your kids miss enough (supposedly, that is, but in fact we have such a shortage of police officers who are assigned to the "Truant Detail" that little if nothing is ever done. Plus in Los Angeles you have a school board that is interested in little more than maintaining their yearly budgets and giving themselves self-congratulatory pats on the back that even if the kids actually got to school they will end up learning very little.)

[MissJacksonCA]

Well when i was in high school from 97-00 my schools all required a doctors note to refer to an abscene as 'excuseable' ...and if you were absent and you weren't excused that meant bad things... you couldn't complete any homework from your missing day, retake any tests from the day you were missing, and generally anything you missed on that day or homework assigned from that day you got an F on... *also* you weren't able to get any notes the teacher handed out from that day... It was really effed up at my school in Ohio where my mom lived ... my teachers stuck it to me if I missed a day and didn't have a doctors note... but my bff would miss school the exact same days with no doctors note either and her mom calling in for her just like mine and yet they would excuse her from school... it was such bullhogginy... I like those laws which force parents into forcing their kids to go to school. Yeah, in my day too there was little the school district could do in this regard, and a note from the parents was all that was needed, and most of the time not even that much. My folks would have owed a lot of money back then cause, like MJ, I played hooky too. Screw the kids who don't care about education and their lame ass parents who don't care about their kids. In Los Angeles, you can be thrown in jail if your kids miss enough (supposedly, that is, but in fact we have such a shortage of police officers who are assigned to the "Truant Detail" that little if nothing is ever done. Plus in Los Angeles you have a school board that is interested in little more than maintaining their yearly budgets and giving themselves self-congratulatory pats on the back that even if the kids actually got to school they will end up learning very little.) Technically there was only one day when I was caught playing hookey... my two bffs decided we'd skip school so when we all showed up we all just walked right out and had another adventure day (be it as it may it usually rounded to about one a month) ... and when the school went about calling our parents my mom was the one who said WTF do you mean she's not in school? Thus... the school figured out we were all truant together because everyone knew us and well... we all got three seperate out-of-school suspensions on different days... we never got arrested... which was funny because this small town in Ohio we lived in was all about truant cops... they were supposedly everywhere! Never met one... I cared about school but there were a few times when due to female issues I couldnt make it into school and its not worth seeing a doctor to get excused from school. And then there were times when once a month we'd just skip and have an adventure day... I wouldn't taken it back for a second either... high school was the best time of my life I didn't believe the bull my parents fed me... I was nice to everyone... and I still believed everyone was sweet and wonderful like me... now I realize I was hoodwinked...

[Cody]

Even if they have a reasonable exuse? still 50$ a day? Damn wouldnt wanna get sick in SC.

[MissJacksonCA]

Nooo nooo ... if you have a doctors note its OK... if you dont its fifty bucks! but your parents get fined so you'd be golden

[AcesandEights]

I think requiring a doctor's note for single day illnesses is absurd. Even multi-day bouts of the flu and, sometimes, the chicken pox don't always require trips to the doctor. Adding to that the idea of a monetary penalty...jeezus. Was the idea fronted by some lobbyists for the health care industry?

[MissJacksonCA]

Well technically there's places out there that will treat children for free based on the parents income but then you get into the whole proving income etc not to mention how long you'd have to wait to be able to receive those services would monetarily stress the parents because they'd have to take the day off work... but... There are a lot of truant chidren in this state... i'll bet Miss Teen South Carolina was one of them ... and they really have to do something to get these kids to go to school... On the flip side... I dont blame kids here for not wanting to go to school the public schools here are a joke and entirely unsafe... I think there's something bigger than this that needs to be addressed and thats education reform... I was hearing about home-schooling today and the DJ on the radio said its all about parents whos kids are such losers they dont want to send their kid to school but if I had children here i'd be homeschooling them or sending them to a private school because they dont meet even the lowliest of standards of education IMHO...

[fartpants]

Apparently there's an old law on the books here in SC that says parents can be charged $50 dollars for each day each of their children is absent from school without an excuse... I think its great ... they're trying to re-vamp the law and use it apparently there's a lot of truancy going on here... On the one side... my mom prolly woulda owed my school several hundred dollars because I skipped a bit when I lived with her ... but ... there's some parents who dont have health insurance and can't always afford to send their kids to the doctor/dentist/whatever ... or they can't afford to take time off work to take them to the doctor or what-have-you so ultimately i'm just not sure if its a good or a bad thing... whudduya think? in England the can fine you 2 grand for each week you take you kid out of school other than at official holiday times, so of course all the holiday companies have hiked up the prices for kids places during these times

[MissJacksonCA]

Wow thats crazy... I think they could cut back on truancy possibly by instituting a year-round school where you only go to school 4 days a week... and it could help if you only went 2 days ... day off ... 2 days ...then 2 days off... The idea of summer break is kinda silly outside of college because when you're a kid and both parents work (as is the norm in the states) they can't take off 2 months to look after you while you're out of school and they only get like a week or two off at their jobs for a vacay anyway... so why not?