At Henrico Schools’ town hall, community members advocate for stronger school discipline

Enforcing Henrico Schools’ disciplinary code is still a challenge at some schools, according to parents and staff members who attended the school system’s town hall April 23.

The Henrico School Board hosted the event, the second town hall it has held this year, at Laburnum Elementary. HCPS staff members directed attendees to discuss “likes” and “wonders” about the school division in small groups, with school board members present to respond to feedback.

Attendance remains a problem at schools in Henrico, according to Aljanette Hall, who works as a student mentor at Fairfield Middle and also represents the Fairfield District on the county’s Board of Social Services. Hall said that she would want schools to more strictly enforce the attendance policy.

“Just for the schools to be a little bit stricter,” Hall said. “How truancy can be improved, or how we can, as a community, if there’s anything that we can do to assist students with coming to school and coming to school on time.”

According to the HCPS Code of Student Conduct, students who accumulate five or more unexcused absences will have their parent or guardian called to schedule a meeting with school staff. Students may also be referred to the school’s attendance officer if absences continue.

A little more than 16% of HCPS students were marked as “chronically absent” in 2022-2023, meaning that they missed 10% or more of the school year.

Tardiness also is a big contributor to absenteeism, said Diane Cottman, whose grandson attends Glen Lea Elementary. Cottman said she would like a policy specific to tardiness clearly outlined for students.

“I was just wondering about a policy for tardiness, if there ever would be a policy,” she said. Because we are trying to get better attendance, and tardiness plays into that, so I always wonder why they don’t have a policy in place. I was just thinking about when I was in school – you got three tardies, you were out.”

Unexcused tardiness is considered a “violation of compulsory attendance,” according to the HCPS disciplinary code, and being tardy to class can get a student marked as absent from that class.

Hall also advocated for stricter enforcement of the dress code to ensure that students and staff were adhering to all of the school rules.

“Back in the day, you know, if we got in trouble or something happened and we had to go to detention or whatever, we used to have to write the code of conduct from the beginning to the end, but we had a dress code,” she said. “And so just to have a little bit more structure, and again for staff as well.”

School board members at the board’s April 18 meeting also pushed for better enforcement of the division’s dress code, with several members commenting that discipline enforcement needed to be “more consistent” across the county’s schools.

“Some of the things being said we have been working on, like we just talked about the dress code last week, but a theme that came up is the need for consistency, right,” board vice-chair and Tuckahoe District representative Marcie Shea said. “We might have a dress code, but is it being implemented at every school? Is it being implemented consistently at every school? And so this tells us we continue to have more work to do.”

Fairfield Middle student Jakayla Pettus, however, said that she felt the dress code was frequently enforced at her school, with many of her friends having to change into T-shirts provided by the school when they broke the dress code.

“Most girls wear short shorts and crop tops, but it’s like, our school don’t play about our clothes,” Pettus said. “They’ll have shirts ready for us. And my friend, she refused to put the shirt on, so she got her parents called.”

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Community members at the town hall also emphasized the need for more family and community resources, especially for families experiencing homelessness or housing insecurity. Syble Pemberton, a resource coordinator with HCPS’ Family and Community Engagement team, asked the school board to explore the idea of providing families currently staying in hotels or motels with permanent housing by partnering with the county.

Elizabeth Broda, a teacher at Henrico High, said that students who constantly have to move housing or move school districts also struggle with instability.

“I’m wondering how we can better support students who are transient in some way,” she said. “So they could be transient between schools in the county or between counties or maybe they’re incarcerated coming out of being locked up, or maybe between states. I have a lot of movement within my classroom and that’s so hard for kids.”

Parents and staff also advocated for all schools throughout the county to be provided the same resources. Pemberton emphasized the need for HCPS to expand the Family and Community Engagement budget to place a family advocate or resource coordinator in every school, and Cottman asked that all kindergarten classrooms have an instructional assistant.

Broda also said that some schools may receive more funds and resources from parent-teacher associations or booster clubs, while other schools may lack that extra funding.

“How do we support schools that lack the auxiliary funding from things like the PTA, booster club, community organizations?” she asked.

Fairfield District representative Ryan Young said the board would review all of the comments made at the town hall to ensure everyone’s voice was heard.

“I just think that it’s important that we hear from every side of the county,” he said. “It’s important that we get those perspectives, my district looks a lot different from [the Tuckahoe] District.”

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Attendees also praised the school division’s expansion of its Career and Technical Education program, allowing middle school students to explore different careers at CTE events and giving high school students the opportunity to graduate with certifications in industry fields.

Community members also said they appreciated other new opportunities created for students, such as the new Centers for Innovation provided to middle school students starting next year and the dual enrollment centers, which allow students to graduate with an associate’s degree along with their high school diploma.

“I really appreciate the variety of opportunities that students have to pursue their interests, especially at the high school level,” Broda siad. “So seeing all my students, they get to go to [CTE], dual enrollment, [International Baccalaureate program], get to be in clubs and activities. It’s a real value that Henrico brings to have that variety.”

HCPS parent Wael Adly said he was grateful that the school division would provide employees with a 4.8% pay raise next school year.

“I have a lot of my community that works in the schools, as custodians, maintenance, security,” he said. “They will love the pay raises.”

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Liana Hardy is the Citizen’s Report for America Corps member and education reporter. Her position is dependent upon reader support; make a tax-deductible contribution to the Citizen through RFA here.

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