THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Thursday, June 13, 1996 TAG: 9606110127
SECTION: NORFOLK COMPASS PAGE: 05 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY JOAN C. STANUS, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: 65 lines
There were those two days in third grade when his mother took him on a trip.
But other than those absences, Robert Williams has not missed another day of school in 12 years.
If preschool and kindergarten are counted, that makes 15 years with nary a sick day.
He plans to keep going, too.
A recent Norfolk Academy graduate, Williams will attend Virginia Tech in the fall to study engineering. That means he has at least four additional years to rack up an even more impressive attendance record.
But to this outgoing athlete, going to school, day after day, sick or injured, is no big stretch. Plain and simple, he just likes it.
``To be honest, I don't care about this record at all,'' said Williams, who lives in Ocean View. ``School is fun to me. And I just don't want to get behind. College is supposed to be harder than it is here. They just fly in college. Unless, I get the chicken pox or something and can't go, I won't miss.''
So far, not the flu, dental surgery, a broken nose, laryngitis, sprained ankle or a bus accident has kept this 18-year-old from class.
``I'm a trooper,'' Williams said glibly. ``I've had bodily injuries but nothing to keep me from school.''
A shortstop on Norfolk Academy's varsity baseball team his senior year, Williams admits he did miss a couple of afternoon classes to attend games with his team. But those are credited as ``excused'' absences.
Any doctors appointments, however, he has scheduled for after school.
``His record is rare,'' noted Kathy Finney, the school's register. ``I'm really impressed.''
A strapping 5-foot-10, 190-pound youth, Williams is seldom sick. But he has gone to school sniffling and coughing a few times.
``I just don't get near anybody if I have a cold,'' he said.
When his dentist recommended surgery to correct an overbite last winter, Williams arranged it during the Christmas holiday. His jaw was wired shut for 10 weeks.
Six of those were after classes resumed in January.
``He came to school every day and fed himself liquids through a straw,'' said his mother, Maurlene, a trauma nurse, shaking her head with pride. ``But he has never gone to school sick.''
``It's a pain to make up work,'' her son injected, a little defensively.
That pain of making up school work has overshadowed any physical ailments. When Williams broke his nose last year in a diving accident, a doctor patched it up, and he returned to class the next day. On Mother's Day weekend, while traveling from a baseball game, the bus he was riding in rolled down an embankment. Nobody was seriously injured, but Williams suffered a few bumps and bruises. He returned to school Monday.
Then a week later, when he sprained his ankle during a game, even his teammates encouraged him to stay home.
He didn't.
``It's just something inside me that says it doesn't seem right,'' he said. ``Some days I've had so much school work I thought it would be a good idea to stay home and work. But I went to school. Maybe it's the way I was raised . . ILLUSTRATION: Photo by GARY C. KNAPP
``To be honest, I don't care about this record at all,'' says Robert
Williams. ``School is fun to me. And I just don't want to get
behind.'' by CNB