District officials are studying 120 high school freshmen on the verge of becoming “chronic truants” to figure out why students are cutting class — and how to stop them. “Truancy is almost always symptomatic of deeper issues in the community or at home,” Mayor Vincent Gray said on Wednesday as he announced the seven-agency effort with Deputy Mayor for Education De’Shawn Wright. “By identifying the District’s most truant students, we are also identifying the families that are in needs of services, or families that are already receiving services but not receiving them in the most coordinated manner.”
Wright said that D.C. Public Schools and six other agencies, including D.C. Child and Family Services and the Department of Health, will examine the 120 students for the remainder of the school year and into summer classes to flesh out the causes of each student’s truancy and create an action plan.
