Trying to ensure teaching is happening does not create a learning environment

Demanding Attendance

A kid moves through the system...

majors in cafeteria
or washroom
or at-the-fountain-as-often-as-possible
and, out of class lots
or in class, but there-and-not-there.
(Tynes, 1990:41)

Students who have experienced violence are often those who are in class but not really there or are in the washroom a lot, or simply not in school. Students expressed frustration with the stress on attendance. It was a rare teacher who supported students' learning even when they were not attending regularly, and students spoke with huge praise of the message of support and caring they took from those instances. It is tempting for teachers to believe students don't care- why else are they not paying attention, not doing the work, or not bothering to attend? But students talked about not attending because they wanted to avoid lashing out at a bully, to avoid being beaten up, because they had no lunch money, no bus money, or nowhere to go to change clothes:

It was really hard for me, because I was staying in a shelter at the time, and there's a three month limit at each shelter. So I used up my three months at the one close to my school, so I had to go all the way up to North York and then I couldn't travel because they wouldn't give me the bus fare. So I missed like, a month, but then I finally got my place and when I came back it was, like, November, and I tried to say I was here all September, but most of October I couldn't come. If I could just finish November to January and do my exam-if I do good on my exam-but they wouldn't even give me the chance to do that because they said- Interviewer: You already missed too much? Yeah. So I lost four credits there. It's always been like that.