For the third year in a row, the district has changed its attendance policy.
Just as students were getting used to last year’s attendance policy, the 2009-2010 school years began with a brand new policy. This school year’s policy is drastically different than last year’s.
While last year’s policy allowed an unlimited number of tardies and absences, this year’s policy allows students 5 tardies or absences. Upon the sixth tardy or absence, the student’s grades will be reviewed. If he or she is passing the class to which they were tardy or absent six times, he or she will receive credit for the class but will get zero honor points added to their grade point average for the class.
This means the student’s grade point average will severely drop if a student has more than five absences or tardies to any class.
“I think the new attendance policy is too strict, especially for first hour,” said senior Michelle Fitzgerald. “It’s not always the student’s fault that they are late. Some students have to drop off siblings, and other people have a hard time getting transportation to school.”
The policy is more strict this year because last year’s policy didn’t work out very well, said Deputy Superintendent Ken Siver. After reviewing attendance records, administrators realized that many students were late to class last year, while others chose not to go, he said.
This year’s tighter policy won’t hinder students from graduating, Siver said, but it will impact their grade averages.
The loss of honor points isn’t written in stone, though. It is possible for some students to get those points back, Siver said. The policy allows students, parents and an administrator to have a conference to discuss the student’s attendance. At the end of the conference a student could be offered a contract in which the student promises that there won’t be another problem with attendance.
But to recover the honor points, the student would have to go before the school board and make an appeal. The board would decide on a case-by-case basis whether to restore the student’s honor points, Siver said.
“This policy is designed to help students and to prepare them for the real world,” said Siver. “In the work world, you can’t be late to your job very often, and that is what we are trying to teach.”
Three years ago, the school used to fail students based on poor attendance. But the State of Michigan made it illegal to fail a student based on attendance, thus the policy has been modified.