See below for a detailed description of how campuses can monitor and interact with the warning letter process.

Step 1 School enters attendance information into SASI and program searches for non-compliant students.

The state compulsory attendance law states that students are in non-compliance with compulsory attendance when they have three or more unexcused days or parts of days within a four-week period or ten or more days or parts of days within a six-month period. This means something different for elementary campuses, which are on daily attendance, than it does for secondary campuses, which are on period attendance.

For Elementary Campuses: The "days or parts of days" clause means that each time a UT (unexcused tardy) or UNX (unexcused absence) appears in a student's days of activity for attendance, that will count as one full chargeable day for compulsory attendance law.

For Secondary Campuses: The "days or parts of days" clause here refers to anytime a student misses at least one-half of a class period. So, each time that a UNX (unexcused absence) appears in at least one period throughout the day, that will count as one full chargeable day for compulsory attendance law.

Step 2 After a seven-day waiting period, the program places students on a three day pending queue.

Here is where all schools can intervene with the warning letter process, despite the fact that letters are sent from central office. The program automatically waits seven days to allow time for the parents to get notes in and schools to update SASI. The program checks for updates daily and removes or adds students from the list as needed.

After the seven days, the program places the student on a pending queue for three days. The letter will not be sent until after this three-day period has passed. At each campus, personnel identified by the principal (usually attendance clerks and assistant principals) have access to this pending queue through the MIS Warning Letter Query Page at https://access.austinisd.org:

• The MIS Query page is accessible through the intranet with a login ID and password (security access is granted by the office of Dropout Prevention-call 414-0322 for requests).
• Once the page is accessed, you are given two options. You can either view a "Warning Letters 3-Day Absence Report" or a "Student 10-Day Absence Report."
• The 3-Day report represents all letters that have been sent. The 10-day report is strictly for the school's reference, so that they are aware of which students have reached this status (which, by law, necessitates filing truancy charges in court).
• Pending Queue: To see which letters are about to be sent, go to the 3-day page. Above the school selection box (toward the top) is a spot to select either "Letters Sent" or "Pending Letters"-it is automatically set at "Letters Sent," so to view the pending queue you need to change this. -After you select "Pending Letters," click the "Run Report" button at the bottom and it will show you a list of all letters about to be sent for the school you selected. This information can change daily.

If there is a student on your pending queue that you do not think should get a letter, you can remove them by correcting the student's information in SASI. These letters are sent based solely on what SASI says, so if students are in the pending queue, it is because SASI reads them to be in non-compliance. The pending queue is there to alert you in case there is an error in SASI. By correcting the errors, you will automatically remove these students from the list.

• Letters Sent: If you do not select "Pending Letters," you will get a listing of all letters that have been sent by central office: when they were sent, where they were sent, and to whom they were sent.
• NEW FEATURE on the 10-day Page: By selecting the "10-Day Absence Report" at the beginning of the query, you will see a full listing of all students that have 10 or more unexcused days or parts of days within a six-month period. This page is just for your reference (the complete listing of letters sent is found on the 3-Day Absence Report page). There is a handy feature here to keep track of your truancy filings. If you click on the student number on the 10-Day page only, you will get a box that asks you to enter the date of filing. Once you enter the date, it will appear on the main 10-Day page screen. According to the new compulsory attendance law, schools are required to file truancy charges when students reach this 10-Day status. This feature should help you track that filing.

Step 3 Letters are sent to parent/guardian and repeated on approximately a four week cycle

If, after the seven-day waiting period and the three-day pending queue, the student is still read in SASI to be non-compliant with compulsory attendance laws, a letter to the parent or guardian is generated and sent. This letter is sent to the person listed in SASI as parent or guardian. The letter is sent to the mailing address, and it is written in the language identified as the Correspondence Language (SASI, Student Atom, Page 2 CorrLang (which is next to the PEIMSHmL field) with a blank field defaulting to English).

Please call the Office of Dropout Prevention at 414-0324 if you have any questions.