THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT 
              Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: Thursday, October 5, 1995              TAG: 9510050016
SECTION: FRONT                    PAGE: A14  EDITION: FINAL 
TYPE: Letter 
                                             LENGTH: Short :   43 lines

JUDGE CHILD BY WORK, NOT ATTENDANCE

Regarding Melodie Martin's ``Attendance is crucial for all'' (letter, Sept. 21): I think we all agree on the premise that school attendance is necessary to learning.

Where we diverge is in our ideas on how to ensure school attendance. Ms. Martin gave an example of one of her kindergartners whose mother lied, saying he was sick when she in fact took him to the mall. If the mother does this 12 times and we fail her child, haven't we in effect punished the child for the mother's misdeeds?

We hate to see people ``get away'' with lying, but I don't agree with using a child as a target to show a parent we are aware of her lies. Kindergartners, especially, are not yet capable of the critical reasoning necessary to understand that a parent has faults. If we try to push a 5-year old to ``just say no'' when his mother proposes a trip to the mall during school hours, aren't we eroding a natural respect for his mother's authority that will later set him up to ``just say no'' to other authority figures in his life (i.e., teachers)?

A far better way to look at this situation is to judge this child for his work. If he is a genius, he'll pass despite the actions of his aberrant mother. If not, he will fail, but based on his own actions, not his mother's.

Sadly, we realize that a mother who places so little value on education is likely to raise children who don't value it either, but all the attendance policies that could be written will escape such a mother's notice. Our schools must deal fairly with her children, ensuring equality of opportunity, though not equality of outcome. Life is like that. Unless we want government to license parents (I sure don't), we will never have a situation that guarantees all parents make responsible decisions on behalf of their children. You can't legislate common sense.

MARY G. MARTIN

Virginia Beach, Sept. 25, 1995 by CNB