Meaning & use
truancy officer
Last updated
Meaning
nouncountable
An official whose job is to follow up on students who skip school without permission and to work with their families.
Grammar: Refers to a person: the truancy officer visited the home.
Patterns
- a truancy officer visits someone
- report someone to the truancy officer
The truancy officer visited the family after the boy missed three weeks of school.
A truancy officer can refer repeat cases to court.
She worked as a truancy officer before becoming a school counselor.
Word forms
| plural | truancy officers |
|---|
Common combinations
- visited by a truancy officer
- The family was visited by a truancy officer.
- call the truancy officer
- The principal called the truancy officer about the absences.
- school truancy officer
- The school truancy officer meets with parents each month.
- meet with a truancy officer
- Parents must meet with a truancy officer before the hearing.
Synonyms and how they differ
- attendance officer
- Attendance officer is a modern, neutral title, while truancy officer stresses skipping school.
- education welfare officer
- This is the British official title and covers wider support for families, not just truancy.
- school liaison
- School liaison is a vaguer title and may not involve attendance at all.
Word family
Commonly confused: truancy officer or probation officer?
truancy officer vs probation officer
A probation officer supervises people convicted of crimes, not students who skip school.
Practice
A teenager who stopped attending class without a reason might first be contacted by a ___.
Choose one answer.
A truancy officer follows up on unauthorized absences. A probation officer deals with offenders, and a school nurse deals with health.
Make it your own
Write a sentence using “truancy officer”, then check it and compare it with the examples above.