Don’t forget the ‘Right Now’ kids

by Leigh Dalton
Director
York County Truancy Prevention Initiative

My job has me working on two parallel paths: one to address student risk factors identified in the Pennsylvania Youth Survey; the other to reduce truancy and improve graduation rates. I’ve been doing this for about a year now, and I’ve had a lot of conversations about education policy and community support programs. What works and what doesn’t? What does York County need? What age group should be our focus?

Many new strategies in Pennsylvania and York County focus resources at the early years, from birth to third grade. But we also have to remember the 15- and 16-year-olds who are getting ready to become adults. Many of these youth live a life that has already made them adults at 15, if not earlier. So though it might make sense to write about the newest, best intervention or strategy that steers that largest segment of youngsters back on the right path, I am compelled to remind people not to ignore the kids who need help right now – our teens.

The York County Truancy Prevention Initiative is finalizing its five-year strategic plan, incorporating feedback from the Truancy Summit held in September. And while, as a prevention initiative, it is vital that we focus on the early years, I remind folks that we want our youth to graduate and become productive, happy citizens of our community. To make sure the graduating class of 2011 achieves this, we must intervene now and prevent some of these students from dropping out.

The York County Truancy Prevention Initiative understands that the most successful factor in keeping a child in school emanates from a consistent relationship with a caring adult. If those of us attending the summit didn’t know beforehand, certainly we learned that relationships matter; all of our youth panelists echoed this reality. Another common trait among the youth on the summit panel was the use of their own talents to help others.

The Truancy Prevention Initiative is considering – among many other intervention strategies – starting a York County Youth Court to serve as an alternative to the traditional district court system that oversees truancy proceedings. Youth Court will empower youth and communities to take an active role in addressing truancy. Youth Courts function using a peer-operated sentencing mechanism that constructively allows the truant to take responsibility, be held accountable and make restitution. In addition, Youth Court offers young people in the community the opportunity to participate in the decision-making process for dealing with truancy, while gaining hands-on knowledge of the legal system.

While all this is happening, the York County Communities That Care Community Board is developing data-driven priorities to address risk factors affecting our youth. The risk factors are identified in the Pennsylvania Youth Survey (PAYS), taken every other year by students in 6th, 8th, 10th and 12th grades. York County Communities That Care is implementing the CTC process to achieve the county’s goal of promoting a healthy community with responsible, respectful, resilient youth. The CTC Community Board is writing the Community Action Plan and will be releasing it soon. The payoff on the CTC process will take awhile. In five or 10 years, as we continue to administer the PAYS, we should begin to see improved results for measures such as the number of kids doing drugs or experiencing painful family conflict.

Until then, we can’t forget the “Right Now” kids. Let’s make sure they have the mentors, the career training, the resources, and whatever else they need to keep them on a path to graduation and prepare them for their adult lives. If you would like to know how you can be involved, please contact me. We have plenty of opportunities. And soon you’ll be able to keep up with our work online: the nearly completed York County Truancy Prevention Web site will be up and running at http://www.yorktruancyprevention.org/.

- Leigh Dalton

Leigh Dalton is the director of the York County Truancy Prevention Initiative and the community mobilizer for York County Communities That Care. After receiving her law degree from the University of Baltimore, School of Law, she managed a truancy intervention program called the Truancy Court Program. She is pursuing her doctorate in education policy at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County. She lives in Spring Garden Township with her husband, baby daughter and her two rescued dogs. She can be reached at leigh@yorkbar.com and 717-854-8755, ext. 209.

Teen takes spotlight at town hall

For our town hall at William Penn Senior High School Tuesday night, we had our Stay in School experts, Bob Woods from the United Way and York County Judge John Uhler, to talk about truancy and keeping kids in school. We had representatives from York City School District to talk about the challenges of keeping city kids engaged in school.

That much was all planned.

Then Ginia Moorehead grabbed the spotlight. Ginia, a senior at William Penn, was the first one to raise her hand during the Q&A session at the end of the meeting. She marched to the front of the auditorium, took the microphone and spoke from the heart for close to five minutes. She told her own personal stay-in-school story, how she went from repeating grades and not caring about school to being excited about her classes and proud of her 3.6 GPA.

She said she has started a group at William Penn, called T.E.E.N. (Teaching, Empowering and Encouraging the New generation), so that she can pass on the lessons she learned to help other young girls going through the same situations.

Ginia was impressive. She put a human face on the issue of keeping kids in school. She showed the importance of doing more to help more kids get themselves turned around. By speaking up, she spoke for the hundreds of kids around the county who struggle with societal pressures and problems of all kinds.

And her message was simple: We are worth saving.

- Dan Fink

Documentary chronicles one town's truancy fight

I've been reading a fair amount about truancy lately, and I came across this documentary by KVIE-TV, a public television station in Sacremento, Calif. "High School Dropouts" was part of the station's "ViewFinder" public affairs program, and it looked at the problems truancy and dropouts cause in one California community and that community's attempt to deal with it.

YorkCounts is in the middle of a series of town halls that focus on this subject. We're trying to throw a light on the same problems that exist in York County, by focusing on the United Way's Stay in School Report, and to tell folks that there are programs that exist that can help keep kids in school. The next town hall is 6:30 p.m. Jan. 19 at William Penn Senior High School.

The numbers in the United Way report are compelling, but they don't quite tell the story the way this film from California does. If you want to see the human toll that truancy has on a community, watch this video. Then come to our town hall and hear what we can do right now to help parents, challenge students, engage businesses and make all of our public schools better.

- Dan Fink

Wrapping up the year

Couple things to talk about going into the end of the year.

First, YorkCounts will hold the second in a series of town hall meetings at 6:30 p.m. Jan. 19 at William Penn Senior High School in York. The YorkCounts-United Way Stay in School Report to the Community will again be the focus of the meeting. Bob Woods from the United Way will talk about the report, and York County Judge John Uhler will talk about his work in combating truancy.

Next, the YorkCounts committee working to bring an International Baccalaureate regional charter school to York has three key school board meetings this month. York Suburban and Central York will hold their hearings on the charter school application at the same time - 6:30 p.m. Dec. 7. Suburban's will be held in the cafeteria of the high school, at 1800 Hollywood Drive, York. Central's will be held in the district's education center at 775 Marion Road, York. The York City School Board will meet at 6 p.m. Dec. 14 in the board room of the Administration Building, 31 N. Pershing Ave., York.

The York County Economic Development Corp. (YCEDC), a YorkCounts funder, will hold a series of public meetings this week and next week to inform county residents of the recently completed York County Economic Development Plan. The first meeting is 5:30 p.m. Dec. 2 - tomorrow night - at the offices of the Realtors Association of York and Adams County (RAYAC), 901 Smile Way, York. Go here to see the time and place of the four additional meetings.

Finally, tourism consultant Roger Brooks came back to York one last time to present a more detailed action plan to turn York into a thriving destination for locals and tourists. Brooks unveiled his proposed brand for York - "Creativity Unleashed: America's Industrial Art and Design Capital."

Some other elements of the plan include:

• Establishing a small Market District, to be bounded initially by Beaver, Market, George and Philadelphia streets.
• Creating a special downtown zoning district to allow for more street vendors and outdoor dining opportunities.
• Making reinvestment in and a reorganiztion of Central Market a top priority.
• Developing new signage and overhaul the parking to encourage people to come downtown on evenings and weekends.

Brooks said the city and Downtown Inc. should have lead roles in implementing the plan, with support from key community organizations such as the York County Convention and Visitors Bureau and the YCEDC. Read the Central Penn Business Journal's account of Brooks' visit here.

- Dan Fink

Survey to bring vital data on youth

From today's York Dispatch:

York County students are being surveyed through Nov. 13 to gather data about their behavior, their attitudes and their knowledge about alcohol, tobacco, drugs and violence.
The Pennsylvania Youth Survey will be administered to students in sixth, eighth, 10th and 12th grades in 15 of the county's 16 school districts and several charter schools.

The article says this will be the first time so many York County schools will participate in the survey. Why is that important? More students responding means more and better data, and that will help local officials better identify issues, assess programs and target spending needs.

In the bigger picture, this is a key part of the effort to reduce gang violence and youth crime and the related issues of truancy and school dropout rates. YorkCounts will hold a series of town halls on that very subject, starting with the first event in Dover on Nov. 9. The town halls, "Kids, Truancy and a County at Risk," will focus on the YorkCounts-United Way's Stay in School Report.

- Dan Fink

Judge Uhler talks truancy on WITF

York County Judge John Uhler talks about truancy and the toll it takes on our community on WITF-FM's "Radio Smart Talk" this morning. His truancy work will be part of an upcoming series of town halls planned by YorkCounts. The first town hall is 6:30 p.m. Nov. 9 in Dover. Here's the program summary from witf.org:

"More than one million students drop out of school each year in the U.S. Statistics indicate that a college graduate will earn hundreds of thousands of dollars more in their lifetime than a high school drop out.

As these figures suggest, education is one of the keys to earning a sustainable living that will provide for a family.

So why do so many still leave school or not see education as important to their
futures? How do keep these kids in school and prepare them for the workforce after they've graduated?"

- Dan Fink

YorkCounts sets first town hall in Dover

YorkCounts will travel to Dover Senior High School Nov. 9 for the first in a series of town halls to engage York County residents in a conversation about the work of YorkCounts. The first three town halls - the next ones will be in January and February - will focus on the United Way's Stay in School Report, and especially Judge John Uhler's Truancy Task Force work. YorkCounts is partnering with Dover Area School District to present this first town hall, which will start at 6:30 p.m. in the high school auditorium. For more information, contact Dan Fink at 650-1460 or dfink@yorkcounts.org.

- Dan Fink