Kids Who Skip School Get Tracked By GPS

suraj.sun writes with this excerpt from the Orange County Register: "Frustrated by students habitually skipping class, police and the Anaheim Union High School District are turning to GPS tracking to ensure they come to class. The six-week pilot program is the first in California to test GPS. Seventh- and eighth-graders with four unexcused absences or more this school year are assigned to carry a handheld GPS device, about the size of a cell phone. Five times a day, they are required to enter a code that tracks their locations – as they leave for school, when they arrive at school, at lunchtime, when they leave school and at 8 p.m."

Comments

Great plan there

[Drakkenmensch]

Because kids who regularly skip school can be relied upon to willingly cooperate in keeping and activating their own personal tracking device.

Re:Great plan there

[Drakkenmensch]

"Excuse me sir, but all the GPS hoodlums are reporting from the same location, every day!"

"Dear god, they've formed a GANG!"

Re:Great plan there

[Push Latency]

Which means they're likely skipping class to play Dungeons & Dragons!

Conditioning

[betterunixthanunix]

All this will do is to condition these children to accept invasive tracking and surveillance. This is not a question of children's rights, it is a question of what those children will think is normal or acceptable in a decade, when they are adults.

Re:Conditioning

[tophermeyer]

...so it's not a bug, it's a feature?

Training for the future

[ATMAvatar]

This, like so many other school programs, is an egregious violation of the students' rights. Yet, we allow it under the all to used "think of the children" guise. What it really results in is a bunch of people who are trained from childhood that violating their rights is OK if the right circumstances present themselves.

Re:Training for the future

[Eevee]

From the fine article

Students and their parents volunteer for the monitoring as a way to avoid continuation school or prosecution with a potential stay in juvenile hall.

So this is to keep children from getting in legal problems. It's not all kids, just those at risk of getting dragged into the court system.

Police Investigator Armando Pardo reminded parents that letting kids skip school without a valid reason is, in fact, a crime.

The entering of the codes isn't just to verify the child has the unit, but also to assist them in planning to get to school. (8PM code entry? Reminder to get stuff ready for the next school day.) In addition, it involves coaching the children to work on their attendance habits.

So it's voluntary, has less impact on the students than the alternatives, and is designed to work with the students to improve their performance. Yep, that sounds like a violation of their rights.

8 PM?

[dragonsomnolent]

WTF? If this is about them skipping school, what does their location at 8PM have anything to do with whether or not they are at school?

GPS isn't a solution

[sheehaje]

Maybe instead of treating students like cattle, schools should become more interesting and figure out why kids are actually skipping school.

I did all the time, until I was old enough to drop out, get a GED and head to college. I never missed classes in College because I was able to determine for myself what interested me and what goals I wanted to achieve.

This was because I had moved into a new school district that didn't really evaluate my needs, and instead stuck be in classes that were beneath the level of work I was doing in my previous school. I went from doing algebra and trigonometry to doing long division.

I'm sure that's not why all students skip school. I sure some are getting bullied, some are on drugs, and others are overwhelmed with their homework. Whatever the case, GPS won't solve the problems.