§ 16-29-9 - Penalty for failure to attend schools.
SECTION 16-29-9
§ 16-29-9 Penalty for failure to attendschools. – Any person who has completed sixteen (16) years of life and who has notcompleted twenty-one (21) years of life, and who does not speak, read, andwrite English in accordance with standards approved by the department ofelementary and secondary education, who resides in a city or town in which theschool committee has made provision for the teaching of the English language incompliance with this chapter, who habitually absents himself or herself frompublic instruction, is sufficiently irregular to make it impossible for him orher to complete two hundred (200) hours of instruction annually within the timeset by the school committee for conducting the schools, and is not attendingprivate instruction approved by the school committee as provided in §16-29-8, may be fined for each willful absence one dollar ($1.00) and notexceeding twenty dollars ($20.00) in the aggregate during one year or, forpersistent refusal to attend the instruction, may be committed to aninstitution during his or her minority.