If those figures are correct, that puts between 14,700 and 20,000 young people not sufficiently supervised, not being educated daily. Vandalism, graffiti, juvenile crime, teenage pregnancy, drug and alcohol abuse are the obvious products of that many children not being in school. After 30 absent days or so, the school district has a solution: indefinite suspension, followed by a meeting at some point with the parents, teachers at the office of a Justice of the Peace. At this point, many students are hopelessly behind their peers, well on the way to becoming permanent dropouts.
Jonathan Gracia and Yolanda Begum, both candidates for Justice of the Peace, Place 2-2, have both mentioned helping young people in their respective campaigns, but with different methodology.
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| Jonathan Gracia |
Given the truancy statistics mentioned above, Gracia's annual gift would amount to less than a dollar per year for each truant young person.
One family encountered in block walking may already have claims on most of Gracia's promised annual donation, as they claim he promised their frequently truant daughter coverage for her college tuition.
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| Yolanda Begum |
Begum wants to be proactive with respect to truancy, "partnering with UT to develop an internship program involving graduating seniors in law enforcement, education, social services, counseling, psychology to mentor students with academic or psychological difficulty." The college seniors would earn academic credit for their mentoring of these at risk high school students. Actually, according to Begum, the seniors she's spoken with seem excited about the program with or without academic credit.
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Gracia, another phony baloney
ReplyDeleteLike we don't have enough in Brownsville. Did he promise hundreds of people they would get a county job too? or just money that will never materialize for their kids, one dollar that's it... :( phoney
Gracia's proposal amounts to less than a dollar a year. Begum's proposal amounts to zero. Nice spinning, Jimbo.
ReplyDeleteGracia's penny promises are total bullshit, a con artist who learned the craft working for Armando Villalobos, the jedi master of bullshit politics. Wasn't that Villalobos who promised, you deserve legal experience? Like Amit Livingston, sold justice to the highest bidder.
DeletePurl comment sense...
DeleteThanks for doing the math Jim. Useful information.
ReplyDeleteWelcome to the compulsive liars club. That guy used to work for Armando Villalobos. You think Villalobos hired people because of their honesty and moral backbone? They sold justice to the highest bidder, hello. Amit Livingston
ReplyDeleteJim, your math is terribly off, i work for the BISD and everyday 12,000 children don't go to school, he can spend all 12,000.00 in one day if he gives them one dollar each, which makes no sense, why would he give a child that did not go to school money, seriously, i would like to know who would be accountable for the money and what is his plan, how is he going to empower famylies by giving a little money, he is no Bill Gates for God's sake
ReplyDeleteI hope you're not a math teacher or reading teacher. Yes, if he gave 12,000 absent children one dollar in one day his money would be gone, the same as if he gave 12,000 one dollar per year. Please tell me you're not in the teaching field.
ReplyDeleteJim, your numbers are totally off, I work for the BISD and 12,000 children don't go to school every day, I don't see how he plans to empower families with one thousand dollars a month, he is no Bill Gates for God"s sake
ReplyDeleteHopefully, not another BISD teacher!
DeleteEither way, whether its one dollar a year or whatever, thank you for enlightening us about a worthless campaign promise. I hate when candidates do this to poor people.
Deletei would like to know what is his plan, his whole platform is that he is donating $50,000.00 for truancy children, but why give money to children or families of children that don't go to school, what does it say to the children that do go to school? besides $1,000.00 a month is something most people give to their church or to their favorite charity quietly, but hardly worthy of a political platform
ReplyDeleteWhat should be done is for the JPs to fully enforce the truancy law, which they obviously are not doing. This would kill two birds with one stone. First, we could get more truants off the streets and into prison where they belong. Second, it would create more jobs as additional prisons would have to be built and administered. I hope each candidate looks into this excellent solution.
ReplyDelete"Texas adult courts saw about 113,000 truancy cases against children ages 12 through 17 in 2012—more than double the number of truancy cases prosecuted in the other 49 states combined."
"The punishment for truancy is usually a fine of up to $500, plus $80 for court costs, the complaint states. If a student or their family is unable to pay, they can be sentenced to jail for contempt."
Sorry, the truancy law calls for enforcing a 300-500 dollar fine on parents. Many of these parents literally do not have $300 or 500. And if they did pay it, it would mean less food for their kids to eat. Next idea.
DeleteJesus, I wonder why Brownsville has a 40% illiteracy rate? Only two countries in the world have a higher illiteracy rate, Benin (41%) and Guinea (42%) in West Africa, which have a per capita income of around $500 a year.
ReplyDeletehttp://www-tcall.tamu.edu/docs/09illitmap.html
Actually, to be precise, Brownsville has an illiteracy rate of around 80% because most people are bi-illiterate and should be counted twice.
DeleteYou said a trustee gave you the attendance information. I think you should ask for the correct information from BISD through Public Information. BISD does not have an attendance problem that is that bad.
ReplyDeleteJudge Jesse Contreras of Hidalgo County has an excellent at risk youth program mentoring teens. Our current county justices seems to be limited in their ability to think outside the box with programs providing guidance instead of prison cells to misguided youth that come before their bench. Or maybe they just don't care enough to put forth the effort.
ReplyDeleteTeens who have given up on themselves along with the adults in their lives and their community sees them as throw a-ways because they struggle to conform as expected. Many times teens with truancy problems have difficult family lives that cloud the teens focus or maybe they have been abused and never told anyone, projecting their anger onto all those around them including people of authority.
There are many reasons why kids act out. It is up to the adults to figure out how to help them not punish them further when no violence is in their history, they are just being incorrigible. Kids need structure and guidance whether they think it necessary or not, otherwise they flounder and fall through the cracks.
Some kids do not do well sitting for eight hours in a classroom setting reading out of book. Many times, kids will do better when engaged in hands on activities where they can see results weekly, not at the end of the years.
I am not saying to hand hold or baby them, nothing like that. Just provide different methods of learning and mentoring programs to reach kids that don't march to the same drum as everyone else. You may unlock potential in a teen who discovers a cure for some disease, if only given second look from a different perspective.
Or maybe they just don't care enough to put forth the effort.
DeletePrecisely. The current JP mentality is to get as many weddings as possible. JP's get paid $250 per wedding, plus Erin's illegal wedding waiver fee, $250-300 for a little ceremony that takes less than an hour. A truancy case pays $0, is an ongoing problem, often complex, and not easily resolved in a few minutes. The current JP's are in a competition for weddings, one even hiring an assistant to wait in the hallways, to capture any couples walking down the hall to persuade them into her court to get their wedding cash fast. Do you think they hire assistants to capture families to get their truant kid cases in court as fast as possible? LOL fuck no the truancy cases are a burden and a distraction, an obnoxious waste of time that could have been profitably spent doing weddings instead!!
From what I heard via an outreach program for BISD, many times kids are truant do to the fact they are homeless or mobile (they move from house to house via family or friends). This creates a problem for students who want to go to school, to actually get too school.
ReplyDeleteBISD won't provide City Bus Voucher's for such teens or has not thought to do so.
One would think as important as it is for BISD to have as many heads in class as possible (in order to get that Federal Tax Dollar) they would have such a program, yet BISD has not thought to invest in getting "At Risk Kids" into school who lack of a stable home.
Too bad the school board is beyond dysfunctional and cannibalizing itself, because if this town had a REAL school board, this type of program would already be in place. Not here though, not in Brownsville...they are too busy trying to sue each other believing themselves entitled to the children's money.
This town only has to look at itself in the mirror to see why so many kids are truant, lost and undereducated.
You all expect the kids to behave when so many of you don't? It won't happen until you all start behaving like adults with common sense, self-discipline and appropriate decorum.
The kids are mirror image of your own behaviors. Reality check.
thank you!
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