How to Ditch School

Some days, your time is just better spent enjoying the great outdoors or getting into mischief with your friends! Whether you just want to skip school once or you are a ditch-a-holic, here are some tips for you!

Instructions

Difficulty: Moderately Easy

1. Make friends with a student working in the attendance office. They can change your "unexcused" absences and tardies to "excused" without needing a note from your parents. This is probably the easiest way to successfully get away with skipping school!
2. Fake it from the beginning. Don't ever let your school have a copy of your parents real signature. Even when your parents write you a real note, rewrite it in your best imitation writing and signature that you keep consistent each time you write yourself and note. Keep a copy of your imitation signature if you need to, or a copy of your parents signature (if it is on school files) and practice it until you can copy it decently. If you have horrible writing, find a friend who is good at copying different writing styles to do it for you.
3. Switch it up once in a while, be creative with the excuses you write in notes. You can only have so many people in your life die in one year and they also have to be acceptable excuses. Dr. Appointments such as Family Doctor, Dentist, Chiropractor, Optometrist or other professional appointments work well. Religious holidays or attendance at special family celebrations. Other good excuses include Migrains, Severe PMS (or PMDD-Premenstrual Dysphoric Disorder), or Severe Allergies but note that mental or physical conditions usually need a dr.s note. Cramps, loose stools, vomiting and headache and any other ailment that may keep you from school, but not send you to a Dr. are good excuses. Other acceptable excuses are illness in the immediate family, death and funeral of family, relatives or close friends, or Court appearance (such as contesting a ticket).
4. My school had an automated system that would call your home and notify your parents which periods you missed that day. So even if you make up a sick note to bring the next day, you will need to figure out a way to get around this. Either skip school when your parents are away all day and evening so they won't get the message and you can erase it, or stay on the phone all evening so that when you switch lines for other calls, you will hear the automated message so your parents don't. You can also make up an excuse to your parents if they do hear the message. You can either play dumb and act like, "What are you talking about? It said I missed 5th period? That's Spanish and I'm pretty sure I was there today! Mrs. Jones kept throwing the answer toy at me all day and making me answer all the questions and then she made me change seats for talking too much with Angela". Or "Ugh! How could it say I missed all my classes when I was THERE! The system is so stupid, I was late for homeroom and the teacher had already turned in the attendance when I got there. He called the office to tell them I was tardy but they must have not got it down. I guess they never realized I was there and marked me absent all day! But don't worry, I'll go to the office and talk to them tomorrow. My teacher can tell them I was there".
5. If you just have one particular class that you really don't feel like attending one day, go to the counselors office and talk to them about your "problems" with your parents, friends, college, life...whatever. You won't have to make yourself an excuse and you can skip most or all of the class you want to avoid. Counselors like it too because they get to actually talk to a student and "counsel" them rather than deal with scheduling conflicts and "bad" kids.
6. I loathed going to pep rallies and school assemblies. My school had a teacher or security officer at each entrance to keep students from leaving on the way to the assembly. I would say that I had to go to "Running Start" or the "Skills Center". They would ask for my ID tag that running start students wear to the college and I would tell them it was in my car since I didn't need to wear it at the school. And OFF I went!
7. If school sucks more than usual one day, it helps being a girl because you can "get" HORRIBLE menstrual cramps and have your mom come and pick you up. Then when you get home, put on a heating pad, eat some chocolate and tell your mom thanks, your feeling better now that you can put your feet up. Watch TV or movies the rest of the day. This is even better when you have a male teacher/principal.

Tips & Warnings

• If you're going to skip school, then do something fun! If you live in a big city, ride around on random buses with your friends and discover new places.
• Nice weather days are good times to skip so you can get out of a stuffy classroom and enjoy the outdoors. Go to the lake or beach for the day! One time my friend's dad wrote fake notes for a couple of us and then took us dirt biking and then to a movie.
• Tardies can always be blamed on an irresponsible sibling, parent or ride who "made" you late.
• Don't miss school too much or you may have to do an attendance appeal or the court could be notified. Plus, you don't want to end up skipping so much you end up dropping-out.
• This is what worked for me, but it may not work for you.
• Make a rough draft of your note, make sure it sounds like your parents actually wrote it and check your spelling. Practice the signature and then copy it. Fold it up and put it in your pocket so it actually looks like you brought it from home. Even better if on your mom's floral stationary or a scrap of paper.