Child prodigy kicked out of school

TRUANCY IS A HUGE PROBLEM. I get that. I do a lot of work with organizations that steer children away from becoming society's problems. Kids who skip out on school are most likely to get in mischief. But more important, they also miss out on their ticket to improve themselves. As they become adults, they find it difficult to get jobs and a disproportionate number of them wind up in our justice system.

School systems and communities throughout the country are struggling for ways to reduce truancy and keep children in school.

Avery Gagliano missed more than 10 days of school - 10 unexcused absences. The 13-year-old was labeled a truant and not allowed to return to her public school in Washington D.C.  The reason she missed 10 days was because she participated in music competitions in Munich, Germany and in Hartford, Conn. where she won the Grand Prix prize. Before leaving, her parents talked with the school district and submitted lesson plans so she would not miss her schoolwork.

Piano prodigy Avery Gagliano also plays violin

Avery is a child prodigy. Watch and listen to her perform in the video taken when she was only ten. How can someone that young have such passion? She was chosen by the Lang Lang Foundation to be a music ambassador and perform throughout the world.

When they returned home, instead of congratulations, the school district informed the family that they had been assigned a truancy officer to Avery.  

Oh, despite missing days of school, she has maintained a straight A's average.

After a summer of school district emails that sent mixed messages: Some said "forget about it;" others threatened the family with fines and the courts. Avery's mother formally pulled her daughter out of school and is now home-schooling her child.

The Washington Post reported on Avery's situation a few days ago and the school district immediately backtracked saying that they never thought of her as a truant and that Avery is more than welcome to return to the classroom.

The district's statement rebutted the original story by columnist Petula Dvorak. In a followup column, Dvorak said, "the school system 'did not make a referral to a truancy officer, Child and Family Services Agency nor any  government agency for intervention' and the 'family was never at risk for truancy prosecution.'" 

Avery's mother, Ying Lam, stands by her version of the story and has the emails and letters to back her up. If the Post hadn't printed the story, the district never would have issued a statement.

The Gagliano's used to believe in the public school system and kept their children in public school even though their talents would probably be better nurtured in a private school. 

Unfortunately, the D.C. school district - which could use all the good news it could get -  lost one of their star pupils.

Rules are rules and truancy is a major problem but so is a bureaucracy so caught up in bullying individuals that they can't immediately recognize the need to view students as individuals instead of being a statistic. 

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