With truancy an increasing problem for schools, Education Reporter Lyn Barton talks to a group of Bradford students embarking on a unique scheme to tackle the problem.

A GROUP of students from Wyke Manor School are making it their business to beat truancy.

In a unique Young Enterprise venture, the ten upper-sixth-formers are pooling their talents towards boosting attendance.

What makes it special is that most Young Enterprise projects are usually about small- scale businesses rather than tackling major issues like truancy.

"We called our group Time and Place; the Time is now and the Place is school," explained Muhib Samad, the company's marketing manager.

"Truancy is a big issue in Bradford. You are always hearing about how it is holding back exam results," he said.

The 18-year-old added that teachers, councillors and other adults were trying to tackle the issue, and the students felt the voice of young people was missing from the drive.

"We thought we had something to say from the point of view of young people.

"We are saying that if you want to succeed, you have to come to school. If you want a good job, you have to get good qualifications."

Last week, Bradford Police had a two-day crackdown on truancy in the town centre. They found children as young as nine and ten skipping school to go shopping.

In 48 hours, they rounded up a total of 38 children who should have been behind their desks at 16 different schools.

When the secondary school league tables were released in November, ten out of the 200 schools with the worst truancy record were in Bradford.

Eccleshill Upper was fourth from bottom in the 1998 tables which revealed nearly one in four pupils were absent on any given day from the school in Harrogate Road.

In a bid to tackle truancy, next year Carlton Bolling College, which has the third worst truancy rates in the district, are to install a hi-tech electronic anti-truancy system which will automatically page, fax or e-mail parents if a child is absent without authorisation.

Time and Place's managing director, Andrew Shaw, said the group had decided the best way to raise awareness would be to run a poster competition among the 40 or so local primary schools. The winner of the contest will have their poster professionally made up and distributed to every school in the district.

Time and Place also hope to hold a gala event at Wyke Manor and get members of the Bradford Bulls to attend and present the winners with their prizes.

"We wanted to do the competition for primary school children to get them thinking about attendance," said Andrew, 18. "The aim is to make sure that they don't get into bad habits."

Young Enterprise is an initiative which gives teenagers the opportunity to have go at starting their own small-scale company.

The team tries to raise capital to fund manufacturing by selling shares and hopefullyfinish up with a small profit.

Tony Kniveton, the Young Enterprise Development Manager, said Wyke Manor's scheme was unique.

"There are 42 Young Enterprise programmes running in Bradford at the moment and their idea is unique.

"As a business it is aimed at the service side rather than the manufacturing side.

"It is very brave of them to take on such a big issue that involves the local community and local schoolchildren."

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