Create a learning environment

Recognize why attendance may be difficult

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.

I was involved with CAS for a while, so I used to move around to different foster parents. When I'd go to a new school, I'd have two months left before the year was done and it was just like I couldn't catch up on all the work, because not every school is at the same position... [Later, in high school, there was violence at home.] It was hard because I'd want to do the work and stuff, I'd want to reach school on time or make certain classes, but because of my living situation I wouldn't get enough sleep. I'd be out on the street till all hours of the morning, I'd finally find somewhere I could go to sleep and then I wouldn't be able to wake up to go to school in the morning. For school you have to have clean clothes every day, you can't wear the same clothes you wore the night before, so if I had nowhere to go to change my clothes or get clothes, I couldn't go to school... if I went to school I wouldn't have anything to eat at school... Sometimes I would get the work in advance, or if I missed a lot, I would get the work from the teacher and I'd do it when I was away, but I wouldn't be able to hand it in because I missed too many days. They say you have to have certain hours actually in school...