It stated that under Indiana law, they could be charged with negligence for allowing her to miss so much school. They could even face a felony charge, and their daughter could be put on probation.
More than 16% of Indiana students were chronically absent during the 2024-25 school year. Although this is a decrease from COVID-19 pandemic-era levels, state lawmakers have taken legislative action in recent years to lower student absences back to what they were pre-pandemic, or below 11.3%.
Chronically absent Hoosier students now face increased disciplinary measures, and students like Layna have been caught in the fray.
Layna is at the top of her class, a straight-A student and 15-year-old freshman active in marching band and theatre at Western Boone. But over the course of her first semester, she missed 33 school days—well over the five days students are permitted to miss in a single semester. That’s not a rule made by Western Boone; it’s state law.
Crystal Ziegler believed that her daughter’s 33 absences were excused because they were all devoted to various medical appointments or complications.
Layna is diagnosed with Ehlers-Danlos syndrome, an untreatable but manageable medical condition that affects the body’s connective tissues. She also has mast cell activation syndrome (MCAS), which is caused by overactive cells and manifests in numerous side effects.
Although Crystal Ziegler has always tried to schedule appointments outside school hours, it isn’t always possible to balance scheduling labs, hour-long drives to rheumatology appointments and her work schedule. In the past, Layna has had four separate appointments in the span of one day to limit her school absences.
Many of Layna’s 33 absences in fall 2025 were due to knee surgery and a complication associated with her Ehlers-Danlos. That one surgery took her out of school for several days at the start of her freshman year—already surpassing the five days permitted by state law. On top of the surgery, she had her typical orthopedic appointments, physical therapy, blood trial appointments and rheumatology visits.
Crystal Ziegler said she brings doctor’s notes from every appointment and every letter was given to the school prior to the conclusion of the 2025 year. Layna’s doctor, who specifically manages her Ehlers-Danlos syndrome, had already provided a formal letter to the school excusing any absences attributed to her diagnoses, she said. This is the usual way for students to have their absences excused if needed for medical reasons.
Crystal Ziegler said she relayed all this information to the school in December 2025, months before the prosecutor’s office reached out. Western Boone Junior-Senior High School then called her, telling her that Layna had missed too much school that semester. After Crystal Ziegler referenced the doctor’s note the school had on file, however, it seemed to her like it was a simple misunderstanding and was resolved.
Then March 2026 rolled around, and the letter from the Boone County Prosecutor’s Office came in the mail. It instructed them to contact the school’s attendance officer, their current vice principal, within a week of receiving it to figure out how to resolve Layna’s absences.
“If you fail to contact the school or attendance does not improve, our office may file criminal charges in this matter,” the letter said, citing Indiana truancy laws, compulsory attendance violations and neglect of a dependent (a level 6 felony).
“I was scared and sad and, you know, really angry, I guess, mostly angry,” Crystal Ziegler said. “I was like, ‘We’ve done everything that we’re supposed to do to prevent this from happening.’”
Jacob Ziegler promptly visited the school and spoke in person with the vice principal. He discovered that despite every doctor’s note, all of Layna’s absences were marked as unexcused.
Crystal Ziegler said the vice principal told her that when she called in for her daughter’s absences, she was supposed to specify which of her medical conditions was causing the absences. If Layna had a migraine, her mother could not simply say her daughter would be absent on account of a migraine. Instead, for the absence to be marked excused, Crystal Ziegler had to say her daughter would be absent because of a migraine due to her Ehlers-Danlos syndrome.
Crystal Ziegler said none of this had ever been explained beforehand.
She again thought the situation was taken care of but then, in early May, the Zieglers received a second letter from a probation officer with the Boone County Prosecutor’s Office. Crystal Ziegler said that in the letter, the probation officer stated that due to her daughter’s “truancy,” Layna and her parents would need to attend a meeting already set up for 8 a.m. May 20 to put her on probation. The Zieglers were required to attend the meeting because their daughter could potentially be placed in foster care and her parents charged with negligence.
“I was scared, you know, like it’s pretty scary to get a letter from the prosecutor’s office saying, you know, ‘We might take your kid from you,’” Crystal Ziegler said.
Layna was worried too—wondering if she would be kicked out of school, have her credits taken away or be forced to leave her parents.
“I was just frustrated with it because it worried my mom,” she said.
Jacob Ziegler followed up with the vice principal, who told him to talk to the prosecutor’s office. When he called the prosecutor’s office, Crystal Ziegler said they told him that because it was an active case, they could not give him any information. He was told to call the school.
“It really affected my husband. Like, he was terrified,” Crystal Ziegler said. “We weren’t able to defend ourselves to try and explain the situation. … There was no level of understanding or empathy at all.”
The problem did not come to an end until the Zieglers emailed the principal. The next day, by 10 a.m., the principal had emailed them back saying he had removed Layna from the truancy list.
The letters stopped, and the Zieglers haven’t had a problem since.
Why the surge in absences—and disciplinary measures?
Lawmakers introduced two major laws, in 2024 and 2025, to address the student absences that rose during the COVID-19 pandemic and have remained higher than pre-pandemic levels. Those laws have essentially mandated that a student with more than five days of unexcused absences over 10 weeks must be labeled an “absent student.” Their guardians must then be notified and go to an attendance conference.
Those attendance laws originally only applied to students in kindergarten through fifth grade, but in summer 2025, Gov. Mike Braun signed Senate Bill 482 into law, applying those rules to all students—including junior and senior high schoolers.
SB 482 further urges prosecutor’s offices to get involved in these cases.
The Indiana State Teachers Association (ISTA) is concerned about student absences—but also about involving probation officers.
“In the previous legislative sessions, we worked with legislators to focus more on getting students and parents the resources to avoid and head off truancy,” ISTA said in a statement. “We believe that actions involving criminal prosecutions can attribute to a school to prison pipeline.”
The Indiana School Boards Association says that if a student has more than 10 unexcused absences within a school year, the student is labeled as “habitually truant.” In that case, parents and students can be prosecuted. Under state law, schools must report habitually absent students to “an intake officer of the juvenile court or the Indiana Department of Child Services.”
The Office of the Secretary of Education responded to TheStatehouseFile.com’s request for an interview with a statement that said the guidelines for what constitutes excused and unexcused student absences are determined by local school boards.
Kent Eastwood, Boone County prosecuting attorney, said that cases like Layna’s are not uncommon.
“Students enjoyed and/or got used to doing [school] from home,” Eastwood said. “I think we saw an uptick in this and I think that’s what also spurred legislation.”
He said that in these instances, a school corporation contacts the prosecutor’s office either once a student has hit the 10 unexcused absence threshold or as they are approaching that number—especially if it is early in the year. The juvenile prosecution then reviews this information and determines next steps.
If action is needed, the prosecutor’s office sends a letter to the family—just as they did with the Zieglers—explaining that their child’s attendance has been an issue, they need to meet with the school, and that failure to do so and/or continued unexcused absences could lead to the prosecutor’s office taking action. If unexcused absences continue to accumulate, the prosecutor’s office may work with juvenile probation and social workers to address the barriers that are preventing good attendance.
“Normally that takes care of it,” Eastwood said.
At this point, the prosecutor’s office typically does not file any charges. However, if this does not address the problem, a student and/or parent could face some type of criminal liability in juvenile or adult court.
“The law, you know, talks about having, like, an intervention before you do anything, and that’s what we do,” Eastwood said. “If we’re not hearing anything, they’re not communicating with the school, they’re not communicating with us and/or probation and the child continues to have unexcused absences, we will take some type of criminal action.”
Parents may be summoned to court on charges of a compulsory attendance violation or others in extreme circumstances. After this, prosecutors can either dismiss the case or enter into a diversion agreement—when the state agrees to dismiss charges if the defendant meets certain requirements within a set time period. Students over 13 could face charges in juvenile court.
“The whole goal is to make sure that the student is getting schooling and that the parent understands the importance of it and that they are not a barrier to the child getting the proper education,” Eastwood said. “I think it’s just the lack of communication between the school and the parent.”
But in the instance of student absences, someone must hold students and parents accountable, and that makes prosecutor involvement important, he said.
What about students like Layna?
For Layna, it was a situation that, according to state law, she should not have been involved in to begin with.
“It was just really confusing because at first they told us one thing and they told us another,” Crystal Ziegler said.
In response to a request for an interview, Western Boone Schools Superintendent Kyle Whiteley provided a statement saying he could not comment on the Zieglers’ situation.
“The district follows board-approved attendance policies and the procedures outlined in the student handbook, which are consistent with state attendance laws and IDOE attendance guidelines,” the statement said. “Our staff works closely with families when attendance concerns arise and considers documentation provided by parents and healthcare providers in accordance with those established procedures.
“Regular school attendance is one of the strongest predictors of academic success, student engagement, and overall well-being. For that reason, schools have both a responsibility to support students facing attendance challenges and an obligation to comply with state attendance requirements. I can say that our priority is always to work collaboratively with families to support student success while following applicable laws and district policy.”
Crystal Ziegler said she thinks part of the issue was her daughter’s social status at the school, which she described as “tight-knit.”
“I feel like we could do better as a school system, as a society,” Crystal Ziegler said. “[Layna] is the kid that wears black and listens to metal, and I feel like even though she didn’t cause any trouble, so to speak, they were kind of making an example of her because she wasn’t a kid that was huge into sports. Like she does marching band and stuff in theatre, but I felt like, you know, if she was a football kid or a cheerleader or, you know, really good at basketball, I felt like they wouldn’t be harping on her as much.”
The Zieglers are concerned the situation could happen again, especially with new administrative leaders coming in that may not know about Layna’s medical needs.
“I think in some respects, it kind of depends on who you are,” Crystal Ziegler said. “Your last name means a lot.”
