<p>I don't know if this is a school policy or a state policy of PA, but at my school 3 tardies, regardless of length or nature, are considered a truant day. If you accumulate four truant days, you are sent a summons to the court. I was late exactly twelve times, and I got one of these. I plead guilty. The form put me under the impression that if I did this i could pay a $50 fine and move on, which is what I wanted to do. It turns out that I still have to appear in court the figure out my "real" fine. They gave me no indication of what kind of fine to expect. A little background on these tardies: I was never purposefully late to skip class, and this was apparent because I was only a minute or so of HR most incidences and was only late to first period three times. I feel like such an idiot; if I had woken up 15 minutes earlier none of this would have happened. I have a lot of questions. My parents seperated this past year, and although I don't think the stress of this had any real affect on me being tardy, they think I should mention it to the court somehow. Is this a good idea? Also, I'm pretty sure the school keeps records of when kids show up when they're tardy. If I can get a hold of these, would the court consider them when figuring out my fine? The original complaint the school filed didn't describe any of them in detail. Should I show them my report card to show them that I really do have a respect for school? Its good. Is there anything at all I can do about this? I'm freaking out here. Is this thing gonna follow me for a while, is this gonna hurt my chances at colleges? Do I even have to disclose this? Help me please!</p>
<p>Class '10 btw</p>
<p>We honestly cannot really help you because most, if not all, of your questions are specific to your school. Talk to your guidance counselor or whoever else would know best about specific proceedings in your school.</p>
<p>Yeah. Sorry I can't be of much help - I know a guy who got 45 tardies this year, who received no punishment whatsoever. But, if it helps, think about it. You're under 18, none of your records should become like public or whatever (though it might vary state to state), and honestly, college officers would have a laugh at the fact that you got sent to court for tardies (as in they think it's ridiculous - you won't get penalized if you do ok academically). You're a teenager, and you're lazy like the rest of us.</p>
<p>This is pretty crazy! Is being late to school considered against the law where you live? Is it on the books? Do you need a lawyer to help you with this? I never heard of such an awful thing. Sure schools have policies about students' being late, and as far as I am concerned, they can be as strict as they'd like. But I never heard of lateness to school being considered a legal offense. Is it a misdemeanor? This is pretty outrageous.</p>
<p>Thanks for the support, I'll probably talk to my guidance counselor on Monday. In response to franglish, according to my school it is classified as an illegal absence statewide, though you need three of them to count as a whole day. I thought they were BSing everyone until I got one of those letters. I assume its statewide and legal because the letter I got was from the court. Nothing I got said anything about what type of offense it was, but I don't even think its a misdemeanor, if thats possible. I just have to pay a fine of indeterminate amount and appear in court. I'm not considering hiring a lawyer; the fees for that would probably end up being more than the fine and I already plead guilty anyway.</p>
<p>schools are allowed to fine money for tardies?!
thats pretty rediculous.</p>
<p>wow, what state do you live in?</p>
<p>California does this.</p>
<p>That is absolutely insane. Do you live in a foreign country?</p>
<p>They live in PA. </p>
<p>Yeah, this is pretty outrageous. I mean I can understand getting punished at a school level, but at a court? That's just absurd. What if you have legit excuses? UGH!</p>
<p>i don't know if California does... or maybe i got lucky...</p>
<p>because i've never gotten in trouble with the law and i've been tardy...</p>
<p>zero period: 30 times? and those are the ones she actually notes
1st period: 15?
2nd period: 6?
3rd period: 50? more?
4th period: 2 (my teacher is scary)
5th period: 5?
6th period: a dozen or so?</p>
<p>i have issues.</p>
<p>I'm not sure if this is new or not, but back when I lived in PA I remember them talking about this sort of thing. Since so many crimes were committed by students skipping school, they wanted a way to try and make the parents liable a bit for their children's actions. For a while they were toying around with fining parents, but maybe they decided on hitting the kids (which would probably indirectly get the parents).</p>
<p>At our school it's basically like we expect tardiness by some people, surprised when they show up on time. We're kind of lax.</p>