Students who don't turn books in on time should have to pay for them.
This seems easy to resolve, any student who does not return or pay for books cannot receive new textbooks the next year.
Sounds like common sense, but it is not allowed. The kid is entitled to a free public education, which includes textbooks. If he never returns the books at all, we still have to give him his diploma -- all we're allowed to do is forbid him from attending the graduation ceremony.
Oh, and if the kid doesn't make it to graduation, we never get the books back at all. It's poor management of the public coffers, but the legislators in the state capital have tied our hands.
And, in all honesty, we're talking about a small-but-persistent group of students. This is not widespread behavior.
Why don't you knock on the kid's front door at dinner time. No kid wants a teacher to show up at his home. Do it enough times and it will shame them into following the rules. I know you shouldn't have to. But sometimes you have to do things that aren't really a part of your job to make a lasting influence.
That doesn't sound even remotely possible:
- You're assuming that we have correct addresses /phone numbers for all our students -- and we do have them for our middle class kids, but people in the class we're discussing move frequently, and they don't always
want the school to have up-to-date information. Yes, you'd think parents would
want the school to have the ability to find them, but -- no, not always. Similarly, some of these kids won't have a picture made for the yearbook because they don't want the police to have easy access to their photograph. I know, I know, I don't think this way either -- but experience tells me that a small segment of our society
does. - You're assuming that the parents would be ashamed or motivated. In my experience, the kids who do this keep-the-book-thing are the ones who think the world owes them something. Yeah,
I would be mortified to find that my kid had kept a book for three years; this group doesn't think that way.
- It wouldn't be safe.
No, I see more effective ways to get those books back:
- Withhold the end-of-the-year report card. Parents do want to see that their kid has passed a grade; instead of mailing the report card, mail a notice that the report card is being held at school and the parent can pick it up by bringing in the books. Of course, now that parents can see their kids' grades online 24/7, this isn't what it was a few years ago.
- If freshman books aren't turned in (or if they owe a lab fee or whatever), don't allow them to begin sophomore classes. Let them sit in the office until they've "settled accounts" for freshman year.
- Don't sell them parking passes, dance tickets, all-sports passes if they owe any books or money to the school.