Graduation ban over sick days
SAVE
✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ An Auckland school will review its procedures after a second student was banned from graduation because of sick days.
Laura Baker, 18, is not allowed to attend Pukekohe High School’s ceremony after missing classes because of anxiety, depression and panic attacks.
Fellow student Mackenzie Douglas was also banned because her chronic illness caused her to miss too much school. That decision has since been reversed.
Baker said it had been a ‘‘tough year’’ and going to school over the past six months was hard. When she really had to go to class, a friend would have to take her. The rest of the time she studied via correspondence.
Her teachers were ‘‘amazing’’, she said, even bringing work to her at home.
‘‘To be able to graduate would be amazing just to show them that I could do it and to say thank you for all of the extra efforts they have put into me this year,’’ she said.
Baker completed NCEA level 3, winning the school’s senior arts award.
But on the weekend of November 17, she got a letter from senior management telling her she was not invited to graduation because her attendance was below 90 per cent. Laura suspected it was coming – other students had received letters that week and she knew her attendance wasn’t ‘‘super great’’ because of the time she had spent working from home. But she thought because her teachers knew what was happening they would be ‘‘a little bit more understanding and
‘‘I think it’s a wee bit silly that I could win a trophy at prizegiving . . . but because I struggle with severe anxiety I’m not able to attend something that I have worked for all year,’’ she said. ‘‘It really sucks that we can work so hard for something and have it taken away at the last minute.’’
Baker said she understood the school’s attitude to attendance when it came to truancy but she wanted more consideration for students with extenuating circumstances.
Laura’s mother, Ros Baker, said her daughter’s attendance was actually above the school’s 90 per cent threshold once justified absences were taken into account. Baker said she notified the school every time her daughter was off, and had tracked her attendance on the school’s app all year. ‘‘She’s sitting at 91 per cent – still not allowed to go. They do go on about mental health but they’re not supporting it.’’
A poll on a private Facebook group for the year 13 students at Pukekohe High School showed out of 124 students who voted, 60 were not invited to graduation.
Pukekohe High School principal Richard Barnett said the school wanted to ‘‘encourage high attendance standards for our students’’.
Decisions about whether students can attend events were made by schools themselves, Ministry of Education spokeswoman Katrina Casey said.
‘‘While we provide schools with guidelines on managing and supporting student attendance . . . we do not give direction on whether students can attend school activities.’’ accommodating’’.