On March 5, City Attorney Rocky Delgadillo visited Venice High and held a meeting with parents and about 250 students who have 15 or more absences on their attendance record. This same scene has been repeated at other high schools and middle schools that are a part of District 3 in LAUSD. The purpose of the meeting was to inform parents as well as students of the many legal, academic, and social consequences that will arise out of repeated absences.

Mrs. Garyn Valdemar is the pupil services and attendance (PSA) counselor whose job it is to meet with parents of students who have a high number of absences. She states that she “couldn’t even venture to say how many students are continually absent from school.” Sometimes her job even involves visiting the homes of students who are continually absent and said that “a lot of times the students’ homes are very chaotic and are not the most ideal learning environment for studying.”

From Nov. to Feb. alone, about 120 kids were issued truancy tickets for being off campus during school hours. However officials suspect there are many more.

At the meeting, parents were urged to make sure that their students attended school every day or else they could possibly face fines for truancy that range anywhere from $250 to $1,000.

Stacy Anthony, a prosecutor, also gave numerous statistics on how high school dropouts comprise 75% of the people in state prison and that teenage girls who do not attend school are usually more likely to become teenage parents.

All of these meetings are being held as a part of Operation Bright Future that is in alliance with LAUSD whose goal it is to prevent truancy and gang affiliation at an early age.

This program, which is also working with elementary schools and middle schools, will also assist in trying to figure out what isssues need to be tackled for a particular school that lead to isues such a truancy and gang involvement. From this program, parents are sent an introductory letter outlining the obligations they have to ensure that their children remain in school.

Since this program was initially started in 2002, it currently operates in many schools across Los Angeles and serves more than 25,000 families. The program has also served as a source of financial benefit for the district schools since the state gives money to them based on attendance records.