10-14-2008 1:51 PM — Metro Police Chief Ronal Serpas will speak this evening at the Metro Board of Education’s regular meeting. Serpas’s rare appearance at the meeting will likely involve words about truancy, according to Metro Police spokesperson Don Aaron.
According to school board chair David Fox, Aaron approached the board last week about Serpas’s desire to speak with the board. Fox said he believes Serpas will discuss the truancy process, and how effectively and quickly the district is ramping up attendance-taking at Metro schools.
“That plays an important part in truancy, and the ability to correctively identify which students should be served by the attendance center,” Fox said.
Nashville’s newly established attendance center has been up and running since the start of this school year, and based in a retrofitted space at the old East Police Precinct off Trinity Lane. Truant kids found on the streets during school hours can be taken to the center, which is run by the Davidson County Juvenile Court, and connected with services necessary to address the root cause of absence from school.
Truancy is a recognized problem in Nashville. Officials have connected it with student graduation rates and school performance, as well as youth crime and public safety.
One of the challenges to addressing truancy is that it involves three government entities – the local school district, Juvenile Court, and Metro Police – as well as community organizations and social service groups. The truancy center concept is intended to formalize interactions between all these players into a legal protocol that can be followed on a case-by-case basis.
Establishment of the center should, in theory, give officials there access to school attendance date for children found out of school and information about the involvement of other agencies. Services can be provided starting the second time each individual child is brought to the center.
In the 2006-2007 school year, more than 25,000 Nashville students were considered truancy cases, according to MNPS attendance data. Under Tennessee state law, a student is considered truant after five days of unexcused absences.
Law enforcement and juvenile court officials have said repeatedly that it is the responsibility of the district to ensure attendance records are accurate. Attendance-taking in the district has been recognized as a problem, and officials said last spring that progress has been made in improving attendance records.
The agenda for tonight’s board meeting is otherwise light, though police and security matters may be discussed by during a period for public the meeting and in board consideration of contracts.
The meeting is slated to take place at 5 p.m. tonight, at the board’s 2601 Bransford Ave. central offices.
Public education | 
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