Makin’ the Grade

Staff Editorial
October 7, 2011
Filed under Opinions, Student Life

Picture retakes:

A few weeks ago, we all received our school pictures. If you’re unhappy with your picture, retakes will be Oct. 13. But wouldn’t it be so much easier if we could just see our picture the first time? This option would avoid several things. First, the photography company would not have to make two trips to our school. Second, students would not have to find the “perfect” outfit for pictures more than once. Third, there would be no confusion on which picture is supposed to go in the yearbook. It’s such a pain getting your picture packet and seeing that one piece of hair was sticking up or your eyes were half closed. These are minor things that could easily be prevented if the photographer simply showed us our photo and asked if it was okay.

Absences… unfair how they’re counted:

Have you ever been absent on a Wildcat day? If so, you will see that this counts as eight absences. But if you’re absent on a Purple or White day, it only counts as four. Although it does make sense to count each individual missed class as an absence, this policy is quite unfair. Students do not get to choose when to be sick and when to stay healthy, which is why some students end up coming to school with their sick germs. If it’s a Monday, students do not want those eight absences counted against them. They are more likely to stay home on a block day. Especially with rewards such as Skip Day that students do not want to miss out on. Then again, this is something that is out of students’ control. Whether it’s a Wildcat, Purple, or White Day, it’s still one day of school. Therefore, they should be considered equal.

Quiet room during halftime for people who want their homework done

This year, there is a quiet room for people who are in halftime. The quiet room is available for students to study or finish homework without any distractions – unlike in the commons area. In previous years, if you wanted to work on homework in your seminar, you would have to opt out of halftime for the whole four and a half weeks! The quiet room is a great improvement because you’re not locked into going there every single day. You can socialize in the lunchroom on Tuesday, and do homework with peace and quiet on Thursday. Thank you to the administration for the new quiet room!

Seminar class first before halftime, really saving time?

Another adjustment this year is how we take roll during seminar and halftime. Instead of going to the auditorium where there is complete chaos and students who refuse to sit down, we must all report to our seminar classes first. For the most part, this is a positive change because it should save some time. But there’s one problem:  we are not allowed to go down to halftime until the bell rings at11:06. Is this really saving that much time after all? It usually does not take teachers five minutes to take roll. It seems like this new way of reporting to seminar would be even more efficient if our teachers could just dismiss us as soon as they’re done with attendance. Instead, we sit there and stare at the clock when we could already be in halftime.