Well, last year, 1 in 4 Kentucky students missed too many days of school.

That rate has fallen since the pandemic, but chronic absenteeism is still a top priority for policymakers.

In 2024, the General Assembly decided the courts needed to get more involved in the lives of truant students and their families.

For this series of Beyond the Bench, our June Lefler shows us how family Court judges are meeting this moment by stepping out of the courtroom and into the classroom.

Okay, conversation.

Have a wonderful day about teaching and learning.

Principal Jerod Garrett makes morning announcements at one of Kentucky's only all boys public schools.

Oh said Academy North is a very diverse population.

We serve about 517 students on any given day.

You come into a classroom.

There's a multitude of languages spoken.

Well, today is going to be a great day.

Remember all matter.

We are all the employer out.

Here today is special but familiar faces in the building.

A family court judge is at school, but without his robe.

I tell the kids when we first get started, the last thing you want to see me at as a world because of me, is that things are about to get real and real quick.

Family court judges can radically change a kid's life, deciding on matters of abuse, custody, and foster care.

But away from the bench, things don't have to be so serious.

A lot of times, some of the kids just need to know that someone cares about them.

And I want to be that person.

And I know that other judges want to do the same thing.

Judge Derwin Webb and staff at this middle school meet consistently with about a dozen students at risk of becoming habitually truant.

It's a small program only available at a few middle schools in Jefferson County, but it's showing success.

So we had 84 students that were in the program last year, and we had a 100% success rate.

None of those kids went down to the courthouse to see him in person.

The program identifies kids early when they've missed six days of school because once they miss 15 days of school state law mandates districts refer the student to the courts.

They might have missed a couple more days, but they never went to the county attorney's office.

Past that.

Judge Webb and the attendance team ask questions and find what these kids need.

Some of those kids have not, have been absent because they've been sick.

They just haven't turned in school notes.

Some of them do have issues of transportation.

We help them out with transportation.

Some say that something's wrong with my computer, so I haven't done my homework, so I stay at home.

We help them out.

Getting the right computer equipment that they need.

It's about meeting kids where they are, wherever that might be.

I have told a kid before.

Look, you can come back if you want to.

I hope you do.

But if you don't understand this, I know where you live.

I will go to your house.

I will knock on your door, and I will see why you're not in school.

And I've actually done that.

He's just not here being a judge in the school.

Showing up in a row and being an intimidating person.

I've been on a bus with this guy, you know, to show a kid how to get to school.

We've done home visits together.

A third of Jefferson County public school students missed too many days of school last year.

About half of those, or 15,000 kids were referred to the county attorney's office.

If we're not getting any response or it's a kid is just refusing to come to school or a family's not helping us, or a family might reach out and like, I can't do anything with this kid.

It's just like he or she is just refusing to come to school.

I need your help.

That's when the court usually gets involved.

Across the state, Kentucky's truancy diversion program takes a similar approach.

Like in Jefferson County, it's targeted, not pervasive.

Explains this former court designated worker.

And one of my counties, I had six middle schools.

And so my DPP, you know, came and said, Ashley, I would love I've heard about this, you know, truancy diversion program.

And I'm like, I can't do all these schools.

But what I can do is one of those schools.

Kentucky's highest ranking judge also supports this model.

She used to visit middle schools, too.

I used to refer to it as a honey baby program because we could be really kind to the family and build that family up and not have the the court part of it ready to fall down on them.

Could this model expand elsewhere?

The Chief Justice hope so.

Her staff are currently developing a portable curriculum that judges can use with middle school students statewide to support early intervention efforts.

For Kentucky Edition, I'm June Leffler.

Tomorrow, we'll take you back to one of the first truancy diversion programs in the nation with perspective from a student who went through it.

That's Friday on Kentucky Edition.