parents fighting Nebraska's expanded truancy law

Truancy hotline road sign
by Kyriaki from Deerfield Beach (Truant)
(Photo credit: Wikipedia, CC-BY-SA-2.0 )

Schools are using increased truancy laws to limit parental ability to make choices for their child even when illness is a factor. Claiming to be concerned about low performance, expanding the definition of truancy criminalizes excused absences, adds enforcement costs, often placed on families, and enlarges the power of police over families, a growing issue in the US schools. Incentives are wrong when schools receive more money based an attendance even from a sick or stressed child. Many different groups are aligned against the law. From the link:

Nebraska parents group urges repeal of state's truancy law - Omaha.com:  The Nebraska Family Forum joined with Douglas County Board member Mary Ann Borgeson at a press conference Tuesday to highlight concerns about the law and announce plans for legislation. 

But Brenda Vosik, Family Forum director, said the law continues to subject families to unnecessary legal oversight, including in situations in which most of the absences in question were for illness.

Some of those parents and children have been charged in juvenile court. Others, especially in Douglas County, have been put into a diversion program run by the courts.

“Literally thousands of kids have been dragged into the justice system for no reason, and it is not ending,” she said. [...] 

The parents group wants to return to a more traditional definition of truancy, in which the focus is on students who miss school without permission and in which parents have a greater role in excusing students. [...] 

Several other area groups either backed the call for repeal or otherwise expressed concern about its impacts. 

Willie Hamilton, executive director of Black Men United, said the state is “going down a slippery slope when we impeded parents' rights to parent.” [...] 

Nebraska Taxpayers for Freedom and the Heartland Workers Center also issued statements raising concerns about the law. The workers' group said in its statement it is concerned that many Latino immigrant families do not know about the law.