Pupils persistently playing truant is an acknowledged problem in Bradford. As schools begin a New Year they know that the district's much needed boost in exam results is not going to happen without a huge hike in attendance. Education reporter Lyn Barton looks at one unusual scheme aiming to ease the problem of kids playing truant.

A SANCTIONED day off school may seem an odd reward for kids who truant, but it appears to be worth the trade.

The Joint Action Scheme, or JAS for short, effectively puts children on day release from school.

One day out of five is spent on the project equipping youngsters in danger of falling through the net with the basic skills to get back into mainstream schooling.

Celia Ross, project co-ordinator, says its success is rooted in the fact that it is outside the system.

"It is our strength that we are not from the school, not from the local education authority, not from the police or the probation service and not from the education social work service.

"We are there as friends and we care very much."

JAS was set up in Sedbergh Club in Huddersfield Road, Odsal, two years ago and for a short while floundered while the right target group was found.

But local secondary schools Wyke Manor, Buttershaw, Queensbury, Bowling Community College, Tong and Yorkshire Martyrs soon latched on and JAS is now flourishing.

Youngsters with a persistent truancy problem are referred to JAS and the first step is for Celia or one of the co-workers to pay a visit to the students in their home.

Parental backing is vital.

"People have this image of mums and dads who don't give two hoots about whether their child is in school.

"That is just not true in the majority of cases.

"Most parents are at their wits' end. They don't know what to do. I know of some parents who have physically dragged their kids to school. The kid has gone in, waited a few minutes and then just walked out.

"If a teenager doesn't want to stay at school, you can't glue them to a seat. You have to make them want to stay."

This is where JAS comes in.

It is unashamedly a carrot approach rather than a stick.

A teenager who joins JAS will spend a day a week on the scheme taking part in a variety of confidence and team building exercises, including orienteering and visits to outdoor pursuits centres.

Celia says the young people on the scheme are treated with respect. They come to JAS with a clean slate.

Often at school they have been trapped in a downward spiral: truanting causes a slump in performance, lack of confidence and more perception by teachers as being a 'problem' and even more truanting.

Children say they become labelled as 'problem kids', a cycle they find difficult to break out of with teachers and in front of their classmates.

In return for the often one-to-one attention they get, improvements in attendance are expected.

Celia would be the first to admit that not every case that walks through the door, completes the 12-week scheme and is a 100 per cent reformed character notching up perfect attendance thereafter at school.

But the fact is that most do show a considerable improvement.

In the two years since its launch, JAS has had 200 referrals and has accepted 140 of those on to the scheme.

Some 80 of these have 'passed.' Success is hard to judge, but to Celia the benchmark is that they have developed as a person.

"The successful ones have completed 12 weeks of the course, they have turned up, taken part and shown some personal development. They may have started to go back to school or have gone to school when they never used to. Perhaps they have started work experience or they may even have gained employment. We are looking for progress."

Over all of the referrals, 67 per cent are accepted on to the scheme and 59 per cent is the success rate.

Truancy is one of the factors that educationalists in the city believe is holding back improvements in exams results.

The secondary school league tables published at the end of November and the section devoted to measuring attendance in schools made depressing reading.

Bradford and district numbers five per cent of the schools from the entire country with the worst truancy rates.

A list of 200 schools in Britain with the poorest attendance figures saw 10 appearances from local schools.

Eccleshill Upper, which at one time had the worst unauthorised absence rate in the country, was fourth from bottom. The other schools that were listed included Bowling Community College, Carlton Bolling College, Buttershaw Upper, Tong School, Greenhead Grammar, Keighley, Wyke Manor School, Rhodesway, Yorkshire Martyrs Catholic College and Nab Wood Grammar.

How Vicky learned her lesson about studying

For two years daytime television was Vicky Wilkinson's main teacher as school become a habit she gradually lost.

By the time Vicky was entering the years where she should have been cramming for her GCSEs, she had never even seen the headteacher of her school, Queensbury Upper.

"I used to go to middle school and that was all right," said Vicky, who lives in Queensbury.

"But I had a lot of problems at school. I was bored and fed up. I just stopped going and I used to sit at home all day."

Vicky's parents were at their wit's end with her behaviour.

"They used to take me to school and they would walk out of one door and I would walk out of the other."

The turning point for Vicky came when she was referred to JAS and Celia.

The 16-year-old had always wanted to work with children and had by no means given up on education.

Celia arranged for Vicky to be interviewed by a nursery which subsequently offered her a job as a trainee.

Now Vicky is back behind a desk as she is on day release at Calderdale College where she is studying childcare.

Looking back, Vicky knows she has been foolish in letting things slide to the point where she was not getting any formal education to speak of.

"I was stupid," she admits.

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