Thread: Immigrants' Traditions Take a Toll on Studies

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/co ... 02419.html

Immigrants' Traditions Take a Toll on Studies
Schools Struggle With Students' Long Breaks

By Ian Shapira
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, March 19, 2006; Page LZ05

Easter is approaching, and that means school officials in the Washington area are bracing for a sizable number of Hispanic students to take extended leaves.

Not just a request for a two-day absence: The vacations last a week and sometimes longer, because students from many immigrant households will be traveling thousands of miles to their families' native countries to celebrate Christians' holiest days of the year.

The circumstances put school officials in an awkward position. They want to respect students' religious and ethnic traditions, but in an era of increased academic scrutiny, they want to eliminate long absences. Some students can get homework assignments ahead of time, but that is not an option for all students in all classes.

At least one school in Prince William County is facing the challenge head-on. At Gar-Field Senior High School in Woodbridge, school officials have been tracking absences quarterly, especially among the school's increasing Hispanic population. Assistant Principal Myca Gray conducted a small-scale analysis in which she began noticing patterns among subgroups of students who were habitually absent.

Gray noticed that students in the English for Speakers of Other Languages (ESOL) program, who are mostly Hispanic, made up, on any day, 29 percent to 42 percent of all absences. She noticed that it happens three times a year: shortly after September, December and Easter.

"We have to be really sensitive, and we don't want to be ignorant of people's cultures and their ties to their homes," Gray said. "However, when they're gone for very long periods of time . . . you can't miss four weeks of math and be successful. One of our lowest areas of performance is the ESOL subgroup."

To discourage students from taking extended time off, Gray said, she plans to go door-to-door this month, visiting homes of immigrant families to discuss the importance of keeping vacations short and staying in school. If students are absent for more than five days during a nine-week marking period, they could fail a course, she said, although it is possible to do some makeup work before or after a vacation.

"We try to be family-friendly. But I had one woman come in and ask to take her child out for one month, and I cautioned her strongly against it," Gray said. "I had someone come speak with her in Spanish to make sure she understood the impact, and she still chose to do it. Her reasoning was the anniversary of the death of a loved one."

If students are absent for 15 days without an excuse, they are "disenrolled" from school and must reapply, which can be difficult because they have to show multiple proofs of residency, she said.

Santos Parada, a 12th-grade government teacher at Gar-Field, said many families are indifferent to their children missing so much school and do not understand the magnitude of the effect the long absences have on the children.

When a father approached him about taking his daughter out of school for a month, "He came to me and said, 'Are her grades going to be affected by this?' I said, 'Of course.' He said, 'What does it mean?' " Parada said. "He didn't understand that when you go to college, they look at your student's grade-point average."

Parada, whose parents are from Central America, said students there typically do not travel south during the summer because the season is very rainy and the roads are bad there. In December, harvests are usually completed, or almost so, and carnivals roll into town.

Mario Guzman, 19, who recently graduated from Stonewall Jackson High School in Manassas, said he left school for two weeks during Easter in his first two years of high school. He said his main worry was traveling to a dangerous country, El Salvador.

"Someone here in the United States, they notice that really quickly," Guzman said. "There are so many criminals and thieves, and there are gangs. But I knew I had to keep my grades up. Homework wasn't a problem."

Don't tell me this district is going to make special rules so these kids can travel whenever they want. Darn, I would have liked to have my own little vacations while I was in school.

Gray noticed that students in the English for Speakers of Other Languages (ESOL) program, who are mostly Hispanic, made up, on any day, 29 percent to 42 percent of all absences. She noticed that it happens three times a year: shortly after September, December and Easter.

Sounds like a good time of the year to double up on border security, airport screenings, etc. to me.