School Attendance

Consistent school attendance is absolutely essential for your child’s success at school. Attendance problems hinder your child’s progress and teach him/her that school is not important. The following are some guidelines and information regarding attendance:

Absences

If your child is absent, please call the office at 938-8750 each morning your child is not at school. Please give a reason for the absence, as we must list it for state auditors. The only excused absences are for illness, medical or dental appointment, quarantine, attendance at a family member’s funeral, or participation in religious instruction or exercises in accordance with district policy.

If you know in advance that your child will be absent, please call the office to request school work for your child. We can arrange for your child to receive assignments for the day(s) that he/she will be missing. If your child will be absent from school for five or more days, we will arrange an Independent Study Agreement. Please request an Independent Study Agreement at least a week in advance to give the teacher adequate time to prepare assignments. If the child completes the work assigned by the teacher, he/she will receive credit for the days missed.

Tardiness

Getting to school on time is an important responsibility of parents and students, and at our school tardiness is regarded as a serious problem. Teachers use the first few minutes of every day to complete necessary routines (attendance, lunch count, homework collection, and announcements) and to go over the day’s schedule. Missing this time can leave your child uninformed, confused, or out-of-step with classmates. Moreover, many teachers use this time early in the day for review and practice exercises to activate thinking and creativity. All of our students need to participate in these valuable experiences!
Please make sure your children arrive at school on time – and ideally, ahead of our 8:00 a.m. start. Students are expected to be on the playground when the 8:00 bell rings so that they are ready to walk to meet their teachers at designated areas. If you transport your child to school each day, you may consider dropping off your child between 7:45 and 7:55 a.m. Not only will your child be on time (and have a few minutes to play and socialize with friends), but you’ll find that the traffic situation is easier to negotiate!
In order to support the value of arriving to school on time, there may be consequences for habitual tardiness such as recess detention, after school detention, and parent contact.

Truancy

Documentation and report of truancy is mandated by California law. Any student who is absent from school without a valid excuse for three full days, or who is tardy 30 minutes or later on three occasions, or who has any combination of three or more unexcused absences or over-30-minute tardies, is considered truant (Section 48260 of the California Education Code). In this case, parents will receive a letter from Mrs. McInerney. A copy of this letter is also placed in the child’s permanent record file. If truancy continues, then referrals will be made to the School Attendance Review Board and the Santa Barbara County District Attorney.