Mass. teachers/schools calling the cops on parents of kids who don't show up for Zoom classes

[dead0man]

link-Boston Globe

Massachusetts school officials have reported dozens of families to state social workers for possible neglect charges because of issues related to their children’s participation in remote learning classes during the pandemic shutdown in the spring, according to interviews with parents, advocates, and reviews of documents.

In most cases, lawyers and family advocates said, the referrals were made solely because students failed to log into class repeatedly. Most of the parents reported were mothers, and several did not have any previous involvement with social services.

The trend was most common in high-poverty, predominantly Black and Latino school districts in Worcester, Springfield, Haverhill, and Lynn; advocates and lawyers reported few, if any, cases from wealthier communities.

Among those parents is Em Quiles, who struggled to work her full-time job while overseeing her young son’s schooling. During remote class time, her 7-year-old was largely supervised by his teenage brother, who had his own school work to do.

Quiles said she told staff at Heard Street Discovery Academy in Worcester in the spring that her work schedule made it tough to assist with virtual schooling and she struggled to navigate the school’s online platforms. “They didn’t offer any help,” she said.

Then in June, Quiles was stunned to receive a call from the state’s Department of Children and Families. The school had accused Quiles of neglect, she was told, because the 7-year-old missed class and homework assignments.

“I couldn’t believe it,” she said.

Quiles lived one of the worst nightmares for a parent: A neglect charge, if substantiated, can lead to removing a child from their home. It came during a period of unprecedented educational disruption, in which parents, students, and schools all struggled with ad-hoc routines that challenged even the most engaged, but would result in some being singled out for how their children responded.

“It’s the exact wrong thing that the moment calls for,” said Michael Gregory, managing attorney with the Trauma and Learning Policy Initiative of Massachusetts Advocates for Children and the Harvard Law School.

this is not too unlike Kamala's anti-truancy rules she put in place (and enforced) when she was DA of SF (and got it implemented state wide when she was AG).

[dead0man]

And let's be clear, no one was ever arrested under Harris' truancy program which only investigated when a child had missed 80 days out of the school year. Missing one or two days here or there isn't what the program was about, it was about chronic truancy.

lets also be clear that when she became AG, she pushed to get the law implemented state wide, which it was, and people went to jail
cite

In an interview on CNN’s “State of the Union,” Harris said her initiative improved school attendance in San Francisco and “not one parent was sent to jail.” Host Jake Tapper then asked about the state law that she sponsored.

    Tapper, May 12: Well, you pushed for a statewide law, right, a statewide truancy law.

    Harris: And the state…

    Tapper: And people were thrown into jail under that law.

    Harris: Not by me.

    Tapper: Not by you, but you supported the law.

    Harris: I supported the law that — this is what I supported, and our initiative was that in the — and here’s — we’re going to get in the weeds, but give me the patience of time to explain it.

    When I was looking at the issue of truancy, I realized that, when we define truancy, we defined it as three or four unexcused absences, you’re truant. I was seeing kids that were missing up to 80 days of a 180-day school year. So, my point was, why isn’t the education code recognizing that?

    What ended up happening is, by changing the education code, it also changed — it, by reference then, was in the penal code. And then that was an unintended consequence.

    And if I could do it over again, I would have made sure that it would not have increased penalties or the ability to prosecute anywhere in the state to prosecute parents, because that was never the intention. And it was never anything that I did.

The possibility of jailing parents was not an “unintended consequence,” and the bill did not just change the education code. It also created a new section to the California Penal Code, as we have already noted.

Harris knew this, of course.

After taking the oath of office as the California attorney general in January 2011, Harris said in her inaugural address that she was “putting parents on notice” that they could face “the full force and consequences of the law” if their kids miss too many days of school.

   

Harris, Jan. 3, 2011: We know chronic truancy leads to dropping out, which dramatically increases the odds that a young person will become either a perpetrator or a victim of crime. Folks, it is time to get serious about the problem of chronic truancy in California. Last year we had 600,000 truant students in our elementary schools alone, which roughly matches the number of inmates in our state prisons. Is it a coincidence? Of course not.

    And as unacceptable as this problem is – I know we can fix it. In San Francisco, we threatened the parents of truants with prosecution, and truancy dropped 32 percent. So, we are putting parents on notice. If you fail in your responsibility to your kids, we are going to work to make sure you face the full force and consequences of the law.