Preston County Board of Education met at Valley Elementary School on Monday night to tour the new West Preston Middle School and to have their regular board meeting.
Aurora School was announced as one of the top schools in the state with 98 percent daily attendance.
Staff Photo by John Dahli
Preston County Board of Education met at Valley Elementary School on Monday night to tour the new West Preston Middle School and to have their regular board meeting.
KINGWOOD — Preston County School Superintendent Stephen Wotring told members of the Board of Education that student absentees at county schools are on the decline, while daily attendance numbers are increasing.
Wotring also announced the county daily attendance rate is up to 90 percent.
“Aurora is one of the top schools in the state with a 98 percent attendance rate,” Wotring said. “This was announced at a meeting in Charleston.”
Preston County Schools Attendance Director Carol Riley said the districts “proactive approach” towards attendance implemented last September at the beginning of the 2015-16 school year is making a difference.
“We have tried hard to educate parents about the attendance laws and the foundation of a good education is attendance,” Riley said. “Students need to be here because it is their foundation, and they grow from there.”
According to an attendance report for Preston County, 473 students missed 15 or more days of school last year. Riley said those numbers have gotten much better, mainly since her office has encouraged schools to use incentives to encourage attendance with giveaways or prizes, which included bicycles and Amazon Kindle electronic tablets.
“They (the schools) are trying to really get the kids excited about attending school,” Riley said. “And there is a difference as we are seeing absences decreasing, but there is still a problem with chronic absences.”
Riley added she continually looks at chronic absences, which is defined as 10-percent or more of the days the schools were open, and gives a report to the BOE every other month.
“For example, if we were open 40 days and a student missed four days or more, that would be considered a chronic absence,” Riley said.
According to Riley, her office handles student chronic absences by first sending letters to the parents after three days of unexcused absences. She said students can have up to 10 excused absences a year either by parental or medical note.
“Once a student reaches five unexcused absences, we send the parents a letter asking them to contact the school for a Student Attendance Team (SAT) meeting,” Riley said. “At the meeting, the advisor, parents and student try to figure out what the problems are and why the student isn’t attending school.”
The SAT advisor then explains the importance of attendance during the meeting, and the problems are addressed at that time.
Riley added the county schools are also looking at attendance in a positive manner this year to help reduce the absences.
“We decided we need to look at attendance at school differently,” Riley said. “Students respond better to positive recognition, and that is our goal.”
Riley said they are seeing a difference from the administration at the state level and it is continuing a trend down to the local school systems.
“The state superintendent is putting a focus on attendance, which comes down to the local superintendents,” Riley said. “We are passing that onto our principals and staff, and they convey it to the students and parents.”
She said the schools are seeing a lot of kids who don’t want to miss school and doing whatever they can so they do not ‘mess up’ their attendance.
“We are happy to see attendance increasing,” Riley concluded. “It is a good thing all around for the students, parents, schools and community.”
Staff Writer Theresa Marthey can be reached at (304) 276-1127 or by email at tmarthey@prestonnj.com.
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