Chester County

Program Description:
The Truancy Prevention Program provides two levels of service to 1^st through 10^th grade students in five area school districts. The students served range in age from 6 to 17 years.

Level I services include daily monitoring of attendance, parent/guardian contact when a student is absent, weekly monitoring of academic and behavioral concerns, consultation with school representatives and referral and monitoring of compliance with community-based services.

Level II services include therapeutic intervention and case management for a period of at least three months, weekly individual counseling at school, at minimum bi-weekly family counseling in the home, review of family goal plans every six weeks and participation in school meetings, in addition to all Level I services.

Truancy Prevention Program staff also attend court hearings for truancy and other non-school related charges, home/school/community meetings and Individualized Educational Plan meetings for the students in the program.

A total of 138 students (128 families) were served during the 2005-06 school year. Of the 120 students for which pre- and post-results were available, 71% (85) of the students maintained or improved their attendance. Of the 84 new cases that were opened during the 2005-06 school year, 62% (52) were promoted to the next grade level.

One goal of the program is to reduce the number of referrals to children and youth services; during the 2005-06 school year a total of 9% (11 of the 128 families served) were referred to the Chester County Department of Children, Youth and Families as a result of dependency/abuse issues within families that were non-responsive to the services provided and one student was referred to the Juvenile Probation Office.

Five percent of the students served in 2005-06 were open cases with children and youth or juvenile probation at the time of referral.

These results compare favorably with previous years: 82% of 121 students served remained stable or improved in overall attendance in 2004-05; in 2003-04, 82% of 83 students; and in 2002-03, 85% of 55 students.

This program is funded through grants from the Chester County Department of Community Development and the United Way of Chester County.