KAPOLEI — The Kapolei Ohana Patrol Squad turned back about 30 Kapolei High School students a day from skipping school last Thursday and Friday, the first two days the parent-community organization began patrolling the campus perimeter in search of truants.

On its third day, yesterday, the group known as KOPS netted only two students.

"The word is out on campus, watch out for the yellow shirts!" said businessman Rocky Paiva, referring to the yellow "CITIZENS PATROL" T-shirts that the 20 to 30 KOPS members wear while on patrol.

The Department of Education's deputy superintendent, Clayton Fujie, said he did not know of any other community with a school-only community policing team like Kapolei High. He encouraged parents in other communities to duplicate the effort.

"We're all partners, we're all here to work with and help our students do well," Fujie said.

Paiva, whose nieces and nephews go to Kapolei High and who has a son who will do the same in the next few years, is so sold on the program that he has donated the use of two golf carts from his trucking business so that he and other volunteers can get around quickly.

"It's a way to give back to the community," Paiva said. "Whether the students know it or not, we're helping them help themselves stay out of trouble."

The patrol members have found packets of marijuana as well as drug paraphernalia along the fenceline of the school, Paiva said.

Educators and law-enforcement officials have previously said that truancy is among the leading indicators that a student will eventually drop out of school or get involved with drugs and alcohol or crime.

Kapolei High education assistant Felipa Save was helping escort a group of students to TheBus stop on their way to a field trip and was surprised that the shelter behind the stop was empty during school hours.

"There are always students hanging out," Save said. "Just talking, some couples are making out."

Establishing a community patrol around the school was the idea of Leslie Mason, the mother of a senior. "I was just a concerned parent tired of coming past the school and seeing ... a bunch of students off-campus," she said. "Instead of just grumbling about it, I thought, 'Well, why don't we do something?' "

Police officer Antone "Tony" Pacheco, of the Kapolei community policing team, has provided guidance for the group. He's instructed the patrol members that they are not police officers and do not have the authority to either restrain or arrest a student. But they can call 911, he said.

The key will be if there will be enough volunteers to rotate and keep the program going, Pacheco said.

Principal Alvin Nagasako said he's grateful for the effort. Truancy is not particularly bad at Kapolei, where attendance runs from about 90 percent to 94 percent. Statewide, the goal is to get attendance up to 85 percent.

"(Truancy) is a problem everywhere," he said. "Youngsters start to develop a pattern. And we try to work with the parents ... but we're starting to see it's the same youngsters. We've got to do something because these are the kids who aren't making it in school, and we've got to help them."

Nagasako said he hopes parents and community leaders in other schools pick up the idea.

Reach Gordon Y.K. Pang at gpang@honoluluadvertiser.com.