In 2009, the Australian town of Beenleigh
began to work against a known truancy problem within their schools. At the
time, an average of fifty students a week spent their days “wagging,” the
Australian term for skipping school. A
partnership was created between local schools, businesses, and the police
department called the Beenleigh Together
Against Truancy program.
The new truancy program involved the schools’
administrators, a coalition of local businesses promised to help work against
the problem, and a full-time truancy officer. Businesses that joined agreed to
refuse service and report truant students to the police department. The new truancy
officer traveled to areas identified as “wagging hotspots” or visited
businesses that reported students. Students he found were returned to school.
(Australia does not impose fines for truancy, but will withhold some forms of
public welfare if a child is found truant multiple times.)
Beenleigh
is a small town located in the Australian state of Queensland; its total
population is roughly 7,500 people. The town’s small size worked to its
advantage. For one, the limited population allowed the appointed truancy
officer to personally return students to school in a very direct method of
combating truancy. Our population here
in York would have made this tactic unfeasible: York city itself has a
population of nearly 44,000. The greatest benefit was that local businesses
were easily united against truancy. By September of the 2009 school year, 140
businesses had signed on. The first year of the program saw an 80% reduction in
truancy.
Beenleigh’s
story is a great example of how a community can come together to work against
truancy. Although some aspects of the program may not work in other communities,
a few of the concepts could apply elsewhere or here in York. For instance,
businesses close to schools with high-truancy rates could be brought together
for the purposes of identifying and reporting truant students. All community
issues are best tackled by the community at large and Beenleigh applied this
concept to great success.
By Derek Shaw
If you’d like to read more about
Beenleigh’s truancy program check out their website:
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