Ella Tryon: New school policy for tardy students is not efficient, responsible

To The Daily Sun,

Beginning this week, the Laconia School District is partaking in new “fundamental” regulations regarding all tardy or late students. Jim McCollumn, Laconia High School principal, states in his most recent email that students who are unexcused will be placed in a room together if they are tardy. He mentions that the overall goal of this is to prepare students for the real world and how important it is to be on time. Many students have already shown negative reactions to this decision. Laconia has been witnessing many issues such as kids showing up late (approximately 100 a day), or students wandering the halls before classes start. The staff and faculty members of Laconia have come up with this plan to simply remove these late students from their classes to speak to them about their behavior, and punish them. As a junior who attends LHS, this does not sound efficient nor the responsible thing to do.

The latest emails and announcements recall that late students disrupt classes while learning is in session and it impacts those who are studying. Coming from a student, I completely disagree. In simple terms, these guidelines are saying that students will be removed from their first block classes, making them unable to be competent in class. An announcement was made clear to the entire school that if you show up after 7:30 a.m., you will not be allowed to physically participate in your classes, and will be obligated to do your posted Google classroom assignments in a separate area than the rest of your class. In my personal opinion, this is making the entire situation of “late students” even worse. These students will not only be disciplined, but they are unable to learn in person with their teachers and classmates. The principal has stated that being late is unacceptable. Have they taken account of the students who are not fortunate enough to have the luxuries of taking the bus or being driven to school, the weather conditions, students who have siblings or guardians to look after, students who are struggling with mental illness and health, or students who simply are unable to arrive at school on time due to alternative issues? This may seem as a strategy to fix these concerns, but it is absolutely not. These actions were not thought through, and the most important thing, students' opinions and point of view on this topic, were not accounted for. Student opinion should be top priority in any circumstance.

In most situations, arriving late can lead to detention and alternative retribution. The school’s weekly email from March 20 says, “We are trying to teach an essential skill that increases success at its most foundational level...” How are you going to increase success rates by removing students from their learning capabilities? I honestly question where this idea came from. It is so unfortunate to see how our school district is handling this situation. It is entirely unprofessional and disappointing. There are certainly better ways to handle this.

Ella Tryon

Laconia