Attendance -- Pupil Personnel

ATTENDANCE LAW AMENDED TO ADDRESS 18 YEAR OLDS Kentucky lawmakers have amended an attendance law, KRS 159.150, to ensure that all students enrolled in a public school system attend school regularly and punctually. The amended law demonstrates the interest and concern that our lawmakers have regarding the education of our youth in Kentucky. The law will become effective with the 2005-2006 school year. The law was amended to include a student who has not reached his or her twenty-first (21st) birthday. The law pertaining to students eighteen (18) years old up to the twenty-first (21st) birthday reads as follows: "Any student enrolled in public school that has attained the age of eighteen (18) years, but has not reached his or her twenty-first birthday, who has been absent from school without valid excuse for three (3) or more days, or tardy without valid excuse on three (3) or more days, is a truant." "Any student who has been reported as a truant two (2) or more times is a habitual truant." Under Kentucky law upon reaching the eighteen (18) a person is considered to be an adult. Adulthood entails many responsibilities, one of these being the daily and punctual attendance of school. Education is the means to a future that is filled with options for those who succeed and complete high school. Learning occurs daily and while assignments can be completed after an absence, the experience of the classroom discussion is not present. With the best of efforts of students and teachers, original classroom learning cannot be re-created.