Of the seven, only Kelly came up clean on underage drops. The other six schools dropped a total of at least 287 children under 16 between September 1994 and September 1998. Farragut, the largest of the seven schools, had the worst record, dropping a total of 135 students before their 16th birthdays. We can't carry them on our records. A committee of teachers, counselors and administrators weighs their circumstances.
Many schools simply say, No.
Janet Halfar, who is in charge of attendance at Farragut, says that so many people are involved in attendance reporting that the school wasn't aware it was dropping students younger than 16. Collins dropped many fewer underage students during the four years examined, but its record got steadily worse. Extreme truants Alice Montgomery, who doubles as Collins's point person on attendance and its International Baccalaureate coordinator, says the school's record likely reflects cases of extreme truants who resist all efforts to bring them back. Some students are just not going to come to school. In those cases, she says, Collins is probably recording accurately the situation.