By: Jocelin Andrade, Alexis Fillinger, Elizabeth Haynes-Meyers, Laila Calderon, Maria Garcia-Coronel
With the return of in person school, student being tardy to first period class has become an issue to both students and teachers.
Recently the new tardy policy has had an impact on students. At Senn, if students are absent after first period then the front office will call home and report a tardy. Before, the office would only call home after frequent tardies, but now the policy is a bit more strict and students are expected to be in class before eight o’clock.
“I try to let the parents know that school starts at eight o’clock,” Dean Marcus Riley said. “They still need to be here before eight o’clock to be ready for class.”
First period teachers are concerned with how many students are missing their class. Teachers believe that students should be accountable for their tardiness.
English teacher Megan Corken spoke about her first period class. “So, for me, punctuality is very important. And that’s a skill that is a skill that you need for life, right. You can’t be late for work, you can’t be late for an appointment. There needs to be an accountability measure for students who are late right?”
“There’s no warnings, so [we] do call right away,” Marcus Riley, Security Dean said.
While this policy may seem overbearing, it comes in response to an unusually high frequency of absences.
CPS reported before the school year even began that they expected a high rate of students to miss school, and it seems that their predictions were correct.
One has to wonder though, whether this stricter policy is actually getting to the root of the problem.
