what the truancy
do you even know that word because you're about to find out // a little casual privilege rage
Last week was so heavy, I dug this one out of my archives to post. It’s almost a year old, but still relevant as I will be experiencing all the same problems in 1st grade as I did in kinder! Cool! Also: audio not safe for little ears! Also: enjoy a visit from muffin when she attacked me with snuggles mid-recording.
About 10 seconds after dropping C off at his first day of Kindergarten at our local public school, it became apparent to me that I would quickly be overwhelmed by all the rules and shit that comes with having a kid in school, public or not.
One of the concepts I have struggled with the most since September the third, year of our lort 2024, is truancy. A word perhaps traditionally associated with “troubled” children, kids from “broken homes,” or “tough neighborhoods.” I associate truancy with an episode of Law & Order, SVU: a neglected child left to fend for themself, or children with addicts for parents, grown-ups who don’t and can’t see past their next fix whether or not their kid is making it to school on time, or at all. Or a kid who has to work because of whatever fucked home situation, and therefore is missing school to help pay bills and feed self and/or little siblings.
Truancy is a story of tragedy, lack of community resources, a dearth of aid for those families that need it to eat. Truancy is the “beginning of the end,” if 90s-era scare tactics are to be believed. And of course, studies conducted all over the country and probably even abroad support the fact that kids who go to school regularly and stay in school longer have a better chance of and at basically everything that comes after. Public school in particular, is the great equalizer. Or at least it’s meant to be. All kids are entitled to a GOOD education, all kids are entitled to a safe place to be, a place to eat, a place to learn social skills outside the boundaries of whatever their home situation is.
This is not the type of truancy or issue we are discussing today. And we are not discussing the politics of social programs that lower truancy rates, nor are we discussing the possible impending doom of the public school system in America! Big yikes! This is a tragi-comedy. I am not an investigative journalist. I am a spoiled girl whining on the internet.
So truancy is a story of all of that up there but I found out this year that truancy is also, apparently, the story of the family that goes on more than 2 long weekend trips per school year.
In January, we got a letter in the mail, addressed ominously to The Parents Of instead of our actual names, and that right there sets the tone. I assumed it was garbage and tossed it aside to read later. MP opened it immediately and read aloud for my benefit, all I processed was a) it was only 6 absences, and b) who cares.
At the beginning of this year, when we were planning out weekend trips, a family vacation, travel for the holidays, and plans for an out-of-town family wedding, I began texting other moms and counting the expected days off. My texts sounded like this: so like how serious is it to go over the allowed number of unexcused days absent? Will the police actually show up at my door to take me to jail and/or fine me for …truancy? Will I be guilty of something that, as I mentioned, I associate with guardians who don’t or can’t care about their kids attendance??
I, a nice white parent, who mostly works at home with her children, certainly care a whole lot. I pay close attention to whether or not my kid is attending school, in that I walk him to school every day and personally assure his homework is finished and in the right pocket inside the folder inside the backpack, and that the backpack is on his back and goes with him into the building. In fact, if I cared MORE, I would call myself a helicopter and it is one of my foremost goals to avoid becoming some variety of aircraft parent. So yes, I care the exact appropriate amount, thank you very much.
Now, in May, 30-ish days from the end of school, I have received a SECOND truancy letter from the government. I am very annoyed by it, first of all. How dare they? How do they know these absences shouldn’t have been excused?! Forget the fact that they perhaps were not for one of the pre-approved excusable reasons, they should be excused because I am the one who decides what my kid does! AM I NOT?!
Let’s revisit my opus about being a first-time mom and having a new baby, and this mantra I AM THE ONE WHO DECIDES, which I learned from Pamela Druckerman’s book on French parenting wisdom back in 2018. C'est moi qui décide! C’est MOI! Non le bébé! Also! Non Wake County Public School System!
Except, apparently, this is the way things are. Kids can’t be absent too much, or else. Or else I dunno, lots of stuff, I guess. They miss out on education? Lort knows I don’t want C missing out on a 13th reading of Bears New Friend, or learning 4 new sight words. I mean. I know it’s important. I want to be snarky about all of this but I also do not want anyone to come for me, like Sara doesn’t care about her kid’s education! No! I DO! I just think SIX DAYS to be absent, in an “inexcusable” manner, aka not for illness, not for a funeral, not for some other important medical appointment, …over the school year which is 185-ish days or 50% of the entire year…is not enough!!?!?!?!?
Are you telling me that NO ONE with kids in school goes on a long weekend more than once in that 9 month period?! NO ONE goes on a vacation that doesn’t include at least one federal holiday?? NO ONE lets a kid have a random mental health day more than once a year?
Am I bleeding privilege and infuriating everyone or what?? lol so cringe. I just cannot fathom that I am the only one who gets this letter and doesn’t have a shit fit about it.
A few years ago, I read Gretchen Rubin’s book The Four Tendencies. It’s a kind of personality test that categorizes people based on how you respond to expectations, inner and outer. In a surprise to perhaps no one, my type is Rebel: one who resists outer expectations, and who resists inner expectations.
Is this, perhaps, why I am so mad about receiving this letter and also that this rule exists? Is it just that I’m a privileged brat? Is it perhaps a little bit of both? And I need to seriously get over myself??
It’s just that, ever since that once upon a time in 2012 when my boss said I wasn’t allowed to take a vacation because my PTO was all used up despite the fact that she and I and our entire team had been working weekends constantly for the prior 8 months (apparently I’m not over it?!), I can’t stand for people to tell me what I am and am not allowed to do with my time. I had to cut that particular trip short because according to her, if I took unpaid time off, which is apparently not a thing if you are a salaried employee, they would “begin the firing process.” So about 37 days later I quit and have been blissfully self-employed ever since. I make less money now than ever before, but I never have and never will regret that choice.
And I can’t stand that now, after all this time working on myself, making my own rules, trying my hardest to make whatever shit I want work for me, working my way through postpartum depression and anxiety and uncertainty and absolute hormonal BULLSHIT, Anne at Front Office has to see proof that I have not only reasons, but GOOD REASONS according to WHO THE FUCK EVER, to have my kid miss a single day of singing the ABCs, counting by 10s, and sitting quietly in circle time. Anne, if you’re out there, I’m not mad at you gf, you don’t make the rules. You’re a gem.
This is another one of those incredible parenting journeys that I just cannot believe I’ve never heard anyone complain about. I have NEVER heard a parent make comments about vacation restrictions, how annoying it is to have come up with excuses for absences and/or deal with the consequences of too many. I guess this is why spring break is such a huge thing? Because literally every family with children in public school ONLY take vacations during summer break, fall break, thanksgiving break, holiday break, or spring break? Are teacher workdays just to give us more options for 3-day weekend trips? Am I just a naive little girl who needs to wake the fuck up??? I AM STILL MAD.
I haven’t decided yet what I want to do about this letter. I think for now I don’t NEED to do anything? I think it’s meant as a warning. Like hey girl, your kid has been absent and we’ve noticed. You’re ok for now, but you’re on THIN ICE. You’re in the danger zone! You’re on my LAST NERVE. What other parenting phrases can I use that are vaguely threatening? That’s what it feels like. They just wanna scare me into not letting him be absent anymore this year, or??
And of course, the other piece of privilege about all of this is: IF authorities are forced to give me a talkin’ to, whatever that might look like: court summons, fine, CPS visit at my house, a stay in one of Wake County’s finest cinderblock and metal bar establishments?? I am still a privileged white bitch, with funds to pay a fine, with means to NOT have him be absent anymore because I have flexibility and the reasons I want him to miss school are like, for fun, not for life-or-death, hunger, shelter, Maslov’s needs kinda reasons. I mean, am I willing to go to jail for this? I feel like, no. As far as hills I want to die on, I think this hill is like, annoying and messing up the view, but it’s not the one I will die to preserve. We will bulldoze it before we plant my corpse there and contribute to reforestation.
Less than 30 days of school left, so will I challenge everything and keep him out MORE just out of PURE SPITE!?!?!?
I need to calm down.
k wow love you byeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee
Y’all have any truancy stories or advice?? Are you Anne at the front office?!?! Can you help a girl out with some tried-and-true excuses and/or ways to avoid punishment??