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House of Assembly - Fifty-Fourth Parliament, First Session (54-1)
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School Absenteeism

Ms BEDFORD (Florey) (15:06): Supplementary: those two cases aside, minister, is there any proof at all, or any evidence, to show that those two prosecutions and convictions made any difference to the truancy rate?

The Hon. J.A.W. GARDNER (Morialta—Minister for Education) (15:06): The member asks about the result of those two cases and the truancy rate itself. Regarding the truancy rate itself, the measure that is most commonly talked about is that identified in the annual census, which is a labour intensive process that the department, along with schools, has to undertake to identify the number of students who are truant. It is a regular figure that often comes up, that students not at school on the census date without explanation—that they are sick or in danger of infection, that they are reasonably required to care for a family member or indeed that the responsible person for them has informed the school of the child's absence within five days—is in the ballpark of 3 per cent, as I recall, and that figure has been the figure for a number of years.

That figure equates to some thousands of students, but that doesn't mean that all those students are necessarily habitually or chronically truant or not attending. On that one day, a number of them will be absent for a day. Some of them will be absent for that day amongst others in a term. There may be other unexplained issues at that time, but it also captures far too many students who are habitually and chronically truant, and that is a significant imposition on their future happiness, wellbeing, success and indeed that of their families and communities.

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