Heliotrope
recently joined
Reged: 11/06/11
Posts: 4
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My ex and I have two children together (6 year old girl, almost 3 year old girl), and no others. Joint legal, joint physical.
My ex has our girls on Tuesday and Thursday nights, and every other Sunday.
Our 6-year-old started Kindergarten this year.
In the past roughly 8 weeks my ex has failed to take her to school 6 times and brought her in late 2 times. The school counts unexcused absences and tardies the same, so that's a total of 8.
One week was fall break so she's averaging just shy of one absence per week. She has never had a valid reason to be out, so all are unexcused. The last time was just the other day. I've gone to school to pick her up (before I started working there) and learned she had been out all day, that she was at the beach with Dad instead. Not a call to the school, no call to me...this same scene has repeated over and over. He sometimes notifies me, like the time before last when I got a text in the morning: "I kept (dd) we go aquarium."
I am a teacher at the school she attends. I just started teaching so I don't really know what happens in these cases, so I asked a few staff members. They said that although the school will probably send a letter home and schedule a meeting (at which they will say "you have to bring the child to school"), they won't take any legal action because she is only in Kindergarten. For grades 1 and above, they are tougher. They send out a social worker to try to figure out why the parent can't get the child to school, and after 10 (unexcused absences, tardies, or combination thereof) they can take the family to court. How hard they pursue this depends on the principal. New principal, so we don't know how she is regarding this yet.
However, I looked it up and the state law indicates that in any school year during which a child will be 6 as of New Year's, attendance is mandatory. So I'm wondering if the school maybe doesn't realize that it's not grade level but age that dictates attendance. If that is the case, perhaps I can politely point out the law and ask that they do everything in their power to ensure she attends school. Should I do that? I figure a social study would help pick up on whatever his issues are and hopefully strong arm him into taking her to school.
Here is a link to the "legal posture" of the State of HI regarding school attendance:
[url=[censored]://sssb.k12.hi.us/attendance_module/IIA1_legal_posture.html]Legal Posture[/url]
As an aside, our visitation agreement says that "parents shall ponder 50/50" but he has never pushed for any more than we had at the time of trial, which is 2 days a week, with a 3rd day added every other week.
I'm a little worried that if I take this to family court, his attorney will realize he is not taking advantage of his parenting time and blast him for it. The result will be he has them more, which would seem to mean she would miss more school.
This judge is widely known for making decisions that just leave everyone scratching their heads. So if my worries seem irrational, all I can say is, "You'd have to see it to believe it". The judge is known for strongly favoring the dads and is even under investigation for repeatedly violating the statute that prohibits granting custody to convicted abusers. We have only one family court judge.
If it weren't for the above, I would hope to be able to go to the judge, explain what is happening, and ask that either the judge mandates that my ex take our daughter to school or that he won't be able to have her during the school week. But given the above, what would you do?
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Buckeye
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Reged: 12/08/05
Posts: 7857
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In my city, we have a truant officer - maybe you could contact that office and see what they would suggest.
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elliesmom
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Reged: 11/07/05
Posts: 8835
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Not taking the kid to school (on time or at all) s grounds to alter the custody arrangement to "no school nights." I would put him on notice that she needs to get to school - and on time - or you will have to explore your options legally for him to only have overnights on weekends. The only excused absences are Dr appts in our state.
FYI - the 6 yo thing is really just in reference to when a child must be either enrolled in school or being homeschooled. They do 6 so parents have the option of waiting a year for K if they want to. Once you've enrolled in school - attendance is mandatory until you disenroll.
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Forgiveness is...letting go of the hope that the past can be changed.
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gr8Dad
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Why does he get so little time with the child? Perhaps you could consider that BECAUSE he has so little time with them, he is trying to cram it all into that short amount of time. I mean come on, two nights a week and two days a month is RIDICULOUSLY low. Standard EOW is Friday night, all day Saturday, all day Sunday and a midweek parenting time session, usualy on Wednesday.
I will be honest, if I recieved such little time with my children, getting them to KINDERGARTEN would not be a priority.
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Why give a "senior" discount, they have had plenty of time to raise the money...
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BeckaLeigh
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Reged: 06/08/05
Posts: 6875
Loc: Texas
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As an aside, our visitation agreement says that "parents shall ponder 50/50" but he has never pushed for any more than we had at the time of trial, which is 2 days a week, with a 3rd day added every other week.
I'm a little worried that if I take this to family court, his attorney will realize he is not taking advantage of his parenting time and blast him for it. The result will be he has them more, which would seem to mean she would miss more school.
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That was in the OP, gr8. She sounds like she is not against him having them more, she just wants their child to have all the advantages of school, as the law says they should.
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I tried being normal once. Worst five minutes of my life.
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Heliotrope
recently joined
Reged: 11/06/11
Posts: 4
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Perhaps I wasn't clear that he is aware that he can have the kids 50 percent of the time but he has never asked for more time than he has, and he often bows out of his time, like if he has a cold or something. I have frequently brought up the schedule just to make sure I can document that I have acknowledged that he can have more time and that it is not me who is preventing him from doing so. In August my ex bowed out of half a month's worth of visitation with no advance notice. I am still not sure why, but a friend was visiting and he said he was surfing every day. It is not always correct to make assumptions based on what one would do themselves. Some people choose different paths, as has he. I would be fine with him having the kids half the time, provided that he get them to school when they are required to go.
Edited by Heliotrope (11/07/11 03:25 PM)
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gr8Dad
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Reged: 06/07/04
Posts: 30199
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I basically says she is afraid he will REALIZE he is entitled to more time and start taking it. I wonder WHY she is afraid of him taking more time? She makes it SOUND like he SHOULD get more time, he just doesn't realize it.
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Why give a "senior" discount, they have had plenty of time to raise the money...
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Heliotrope
recently joined
Reged: 11/06/11
Posts: 4
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Perhaps I was not clear. The fear I have is that by bringing up this issue he will be prompted by his attorney to take his full parenting time, and not because of intrinsic motivation to do so. Reasons for feeling this way given below. Bottom line, he cannot seem to get her to school. She is absent again today. She was fine when I dropped her off yesterday, they had a weekend day together, and today she is not here. Nor was she here Friday. This is not ok. Besides asking him regularly if he wants to change the schedule in any way, when she is on break I always ask him if he wants more time with the kids, and he has never responded. This, combined with the history of bowing out of the time he has committed to, leads me believe that it is not because he does not feel he has enough time with her. Plus, he has directly lamented to me that it's' nearly impossible for him to get her to school in the morning. So I don't know what else to conclude other than that he is presently having a hard time doing the responsible part of parenting.
Edited by Heliotrope (11/07/11 03:27 PM)
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ssmom79
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Reged: 06/27/07
Posts: 7784
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Have you considered offering to take her to school since you work there anyway? Is that something he might go for?
It's school, kindergarten or not, it's school and a responsibility.
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Heliotrope
recently joined
Reged: 11/06/11
Posts: 4
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ssmom, thanks for your reply. I have indeed considered doing that. However I'm wondering if I could be viewed as overstepping my bounds, an arrow his lawyer has slung at me a few times already. Plus, is it wrong for me to want him to step up if he's going to be a custodial parent? Or should I just let that one go?
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