The school board heard about the changes in attendance policy proposed by Del Stein, principal of Halverson Elementary school, Monday night.

“We’ve made a shift in how we view absent days,” said Stein. “Sickness and family funerals will be excused, but other things, such as vacations, sporting events, shopping and sleeping in will be counted as unexcused.”

The change in policy reflects a problem that Halverson has had with many parents letting their children skip school for, many times, frivolous reasons. With the new policy, the schools can be a bit more strict in their judgement of how many days are too many to be missing.

Stein said that after nine unexcused absences the student and the student’s parent will have to sign a contract for attendance, further unexcused absences can be sent to the county attorney for investigations of neglegence.

Though most students are attending school, Stein said that 5 to 8 percent of students are having too many unexcused absences from school.

“With the new plan, we have options,” said Stein. “Instead of saying ‘gee, we sure would like to see you son in school more,’ we have contracts.”

Stein said he hopes that the contracts will help to cut down absences, and said such programs have worked well in the past.

Also during Monday night’s school board meeting:

A community finance committee was proposed at the recent district workshop on finances, according to school board member Tom Eaton.

Eaton said the committee idea was suggested to help increase public involvement and knowledge of the district’s budget along with increasing input from the community.

Mark Stotts, the financial manager for the district, said that the community committee system has been implemented in Owatanna and Rochester and has worked very well.