School board approves flexible attendance program for students in need

Some students need to work in order to support the rest of the family. It can be a reality of life. That may be just one example, but attendance standards at school can be difficult to meet for a variety of reasons as well. The school district wants to make sure that no student is left behind, particularly those that are close to dropping out, which can occur for various reasons that are out of the students control. The San Marcos Consolidated Independent School District Board of Trustees approved the Optional Flexible School Day Program for the 2024-2025 school year at the regularly scheduled meeting Monday in order to ensure the allowance of flexibility in student scheduling to account for individual needs and promote graduation for all students.

According to the Texas Education Agency website, the goal of the Optional Flexible School Day Program is to improve graduation rates for students who are in danger of dropping out of school, have dropped out or are behind in core subject courses. The program allows districts to provide flexible hours and days of attendance for students who meet at least one of the requirements of the Texas Education Code §29.0822(a). According to Texas Education Code §29.0822(a), an Optional Flexible School Day Program may be applied to students who: • have dropped out of school or are at risk of dropping out of school.

• attend a campus that is implementing an innovative redesign of the campus or an early college high school under a plan approved by the commissioner.

• as a result of attendance requirements under Section 25.092, will be denied credit for one or more classes in which the students have been enrolled.

“We did not have this this past year, so the central office is taking ownership of submitting this waiver to you all every year,” said SMCISD Superintendent Michael Cardona. “Really what this will allow us to do is to build schedules that meet individual students’ needs, particularly at the high school but throughout the district.”

Cardona said this would allow situations where a student may only need to attend class for one or two periods a day.

“Then we can build that [schedule], and they won’t be penalized through attendance,” Cardona said. “The district won’t be penalized [for attendance], and so it just allows us to be more flexible in building schedules.”

Cardona said the way things currently stand, a student that is in the program must attend class all day. “This is to help us change that,” Cardona said.

“[We can] just meet the kids where they’re at [and meet] the parents where they are at.” SMCISD Board Vice President Clementine Cantu made a motion to approve the Optional Flexible School Day Program, which was seconded by SMCISD District-1 Trustee Jessica Cain. The motion passed unanimously.

According to the TEA website, the school district must allow a minimum of 30 days for application review and must receive approval from the TEA before initiating the program. This means, if approved, the program should go into effect for the upcoming 2024-2025 school year. SMCISD will have to submit an annual application to be eligible for the program. A student in any grade level may utilize the program as long as the student meets the eligibility requirements under Texas Education Code §29.0822(a).