Helena: Attendance advocate

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His title is truancy intervention specialist.

But in reality, Rob Bird is a chauffeur, guidance counselor, teacher and friend.

Attendance advocate

         

By CAROLYNN BRIGHT - IR Staff Writer - 02/21/2006

       

Jon Ebelt IR Staff Photographer - Rossiter School Principal Kareen Bangert, left, and truancy specialist Robert Bird discuss how a couple of students Bangert is concernced about are doing in terms of school attendance. Bird is responsible for tracking truancy problems for students in grades third through eighth for all Lewis and Clark County schools.

                  

His title is truancy intervention specialist.                                   

But in reality, Rob Bird is a chauffeur, guidance counselor, teacher and friend.

“Every day is different,” said Bird, who started working for Montana Youth Homes’ truancy intervention program about a year ago.

Bird’s job — funded through a grant from the Montana Board of Crime Control — is to take referrals from Helena School District principals of children whose attendance at school is less than exemplary.

“They have a lot of different reasons for not going to school,” he said, adding that his first step is to meet with the families in question about the concerns of school administrators, and find out why the children aren’t consistently getting to class.

According to Bird — who generally serves students attending grades three through eight — the problem can be as basic as poverty.

He said it isn’t uncommon for the parents of a truant child to explain that they don’t live close enough to the school for their children to walk when the temperature takes a dive — and at the same time, they don‘t live far enough away from the school to qualify for bus service.

The issue is sometimes compounded by the fact the parents don’t have a car, or if they do, they can’t afford to put gas in it.

In those cases, Bird says he has gone so far as to pick the children up for school each morning, and deliver them back home after the dismissal bell rings.

Other times, Bird will discover that a child is pretending to be sick, or simply leaving the house each day and not going to school, because he or she has a learning disability or problem that hasn’t yet been identified by the school district.

“I had one girl who would skip the morning because she knew she had math. She just didn’t get it, and she would get so frustrated,” said Bird.

Bird worked with administrators at the child’s school, and her parents to get her a math tutor. He said the girl’s attendance isn’t perfect, but it has vastly improved since the tutor came into the picture.

Bird said he likes those situations where it’s relatively easy to identify the problem, and to work to a solution. But the answers aren’t always as readily available.

Sometimes the problem is more entrenched.

According to Bird, it’s difficult to impress the importance of an education on a child whose parents don’t make learning a priority.

“It’s a cycle,” he said. “And it’s hard to break that sometimes.”

In many cases, Bird finds that the truant child’s parents didn’t pursue higher education, or even finish high school. So, it’s pretty easy to understand how the children might place their priorities elsewhere.

“It took me until I was 31 to realize that I needed a degree,” he said, explaining that he fell into that trap, too.

Currently, Bird is taking college courses over the Internet, so he’s speaking from experience when he tells the families he works with that it’s never to late to obtain a GED or look into higher education.

He says he has put parents of children he is assisting in touch with educational resources such as the Adult Learning Center and the Career Training Institute.

“Parents need to reinforce that education is important,” Bird said. “If the parents are getting educated, then the kids are more likely to do it, too.”

Bird said he also tries to expose the children he helps to the benefits, and fun, of learning. Last summer, he enrolled some of his charges in summer enrichment programs, took them to the lake, and even for a spin on the tour train.

In the past year, Bird said the program has aided about 50 families, and he doesn’t hesitate to say that the parents aren’t always happy when he shows up at their door.

According to Bird, most families he contacts are reluctant at first, but often warm up to him after he explains that he isn’t part of the juvenile justice system or the Department of Public Heath and Human Services.

“There’s really nothing I can do to punish them if they don’t work with me,” he said. “This program wants to be a diversion, not a last resort.”

Before taking the job as truancy intervention specialist, Bird worked as a detention officer, a police officer and for the Montana Department of Corrections. So he knows what sometimes happens when children get distracted from their education, and make bad choices.

Bird said he knows the effort he is putting into helping children and their families is making a difference when he stops receiving calls from school staff members.

“It’s nice when it finally clicks,” he said.