Explaining a Concept

Judith Richmond

Explaining A Concept

English 1510, Composition 1

Mr. James Barry M.A.

Juvenile Truancy

For too many youngsters, cutting classes is the first slip down the icy slope

toward delinquency. As early as 1915, sociologists were calling truancy the

"kindergarten of crime." A 1979 study of 258 adult re-offenders showed that 78%

had been arrested for truancy, and two-thirds of the remainder admitted they had

been chronically truant but were never arrested. (Gavin 1997)

There is a sense that parents fear truancy as if it were an infectious disease

that will strike their own kids if it isn't eradicated. In the book, Fear of Falling:

The Inner Life of the Middle Class, Barbara Ehrenreich wrote that middle-class

parents now see education as the only way they can help their youngsters succeed.

Gone are the days when kids who hated school could still find a secure

home in the military or a high-paying job on the line in the factory. A high-school

diploma today is no guarantee of a job that pays enough to raise a family.

Concerned parents worry that high school graduation is merely the minimum their

kids must attain. So it is easy to understand why people are quick to demand

drastic action to bring truancy under control. Yet when challenged to think of all

the reasons that a youngster might cut school, it quickly becomes clear that

solving the problem defies a quick-fix, get-tough approach. Certainly, there are

kids who cut classes to hang out with friends and, left unchecked, today's lark can

become tomorrow's chronic bad habit. There are also kids whose parents simply

do not care - maybe Mom and Dad hated school, too, and consciously or

unconsciously send that message. But tough talk will do little to help the kids who

fail at school because of abuse at home. Youngsters who endure physical,

emotional and sexual abuse at the hands of their parents may well face more of it

if the parents are forced to pay fines or do jail time if the youngster cuts classes.

Sometimes parents are not the only causation for truancy, A detective in Lansing,

Michigan, who was investigating the chronic truancy of two adolescent girls,

discovered that a 27-year-old man had lured them into spending time at his

apartment during the day. And what of the youngsters who are bullied every day,

forced to hand over their lunch money? We know how merciless kids can be

when teasing those who are different - too tall, too short, too fat, too skinny, too

light, too dark. Imagine kids that are gay, some who are taunted and attacked

every day for being a "fag." A Massachusetts Department of Education Youth

Risk Behavior survey in 1997 showed that 22% of gay, lesbian and bisexual

students reported skipping school because of safety concerns, compared to 4% of

their peers. A U.S. Department of Health and Human