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Badges to track truants, tardies
Memphis has signed up for expensive technology to make the school-to-jail pipeline more efficient. Do you suppose that Memphis schools also use bar code technology to make sure that student lavatories are fully stocked?
Note the terminology: serving time.
Here's the subhead: Memphis schools to use bar-coded ID system to monitor infractions.
By Jane Roberts
A new trigger at city middle and high schools is going to start tripping up the truant and the tardy beginning Monday.
Memphis City Schools is the first urban district in the nation to use a bar-coded student ID badge that not only gives principals access to the student's schedule but also flashes up a current photo and keeps a running list of infractions, including tardies.
Memphis City Schools is implementing a new school ID program that assigns each student a bar code allowing administrators to better track disciplinary problems.
The district paid $475,000, for 70 mobile units designed by Socket Mobile Inc. and Plasco ID. The annual maintenance fee is $80,000.
Starting Monday, every student who comes in late will have to show the badge to be admitted to class. A portable Bluetooth printer will automatically print a hall pass or, on later infractions, a detention pass, including the number of the room where the time is to be served.
"In other words, you are responsible for your actions," says Sgt. Kenneth Pinkney, the career Marine in charge of student behavior and intervention in the city schools.
Kids caught raising a ruckus at a dance or ball game, for instance, will get their cards scanned on the spot and can expect a demerit or at least a talking to in the principal's office.
"If a security guard sees you creating trouble at a school event, we now have a way of getting your name and making a note," Pinkney said.
Ditto for the tardy who try to escape by signing someone else's name or by writing so illegibly no one could ever read it, said Pinkney, a former principal at Geeter Middle School, who assures visitors he's seen enough tricks to know his job just got easier.
"As a principal, I would have loved to have this," he says, tapping the laptop he's been using for weeks to wow administrators with what WiFi can do for them.
But as an administrator, Pinkney now has a retrievable database for analyzing what he likes to call "situations" -- anything from a chronic late bus, which might indicate a sleepyhead at the wheel, or a persistent discipline problem that could be traced to a study hall.
Besides assuring that every student in the building is in the right place, the system smoothes out the lines that cause kids to miss even more class time, Pinkney said.
"If we have a late bus, instead of the student coming all the way into school to get a pass, we can print one right there," he said.
"We won't have to have 50 kids lined up at the driveway," an efficiency he calls "time on task."
Each district squad car is equipped with a hand-held computer. Next year, the badges will extend to elementary-age kids.
Students congregating Friday at Memphis Athletic Ministries on Cleveland had already gotten the word.
"If you're late, they're going to get you," said Xzavier Lindsey, a senior at Central High who's seen other systems and suspects this one may be the real thing.
Brandon Cooper, also a senior at Central, wonders if excused absences will be a thing of the past.
"Sometimes people make mistakes. I'm afraid with this system, you won't be able to explain to someone what happened."
Later this year, the district will add an interface to message a parent's cell phone by text or voice or leave word on the home phone.
For now, Socket Mobile/Plasco ID automatically prints a letter advising parents of the infraction, saving the district clerical time, Pinkney said.
Socket Mobile launched its version of the handheld computer this year, targeting mobile workers in small to medium-sized businesses, including ballpark hot dog vendors who use the system to forward orders to the kitchen.
"Memphis is our first district-wide deployment," said Dan Recchia, company spokesman. "The Miami school system has deployed a number of our systems. Their tardies dropped dramatically because the kids realized, 'My parents do find out,'" he said.
While the badges fit Supt. Kriner Cash's stepped-up security mandate, MCS has been researching badge plans since last spring.
"We had pilots in five schools," Pinkney said. "This is the system that worked best for our needs."
What changes under Cash is the frequency of the staff audits, Pinkney said.
"Last year, we brought all the players in -- security people, truancy people, gang experts, behavioral experts, counselors and Memphis city police -- every 20 days. Now, its going to be every 10 days."
— Jane Roberts
Memphis Commercial Appeal
2008-08-18
http://www.commercialappeal.com/news/2008/aug/17/badges-to-track-truants-tardies/?feedback=1#comments
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