Summer school, online courses, and an extra school year doesn’t seem too appealing to most students, but with the recent uptick in tardies, these consequences have become more routine. HHS students accumulated a total of 10,785 tardies in the past year alone, causing concern among school administrators.

This year, a new, more stringent policy has been put into place in an attempt to reduce the number of tardies students accumulate.

“We found that many students who lost credit in classes did so because of chronic tardiness, and that was worrisome,” principal Karen Bingert said. “Students would go right up to the limit for unimportant things and then not have a cushion if they needed to be late for something serious (think stopping for coffee on the way to school versus getting a flat tire on the way to school).  Once they had used up the tardies as if they were freebies, they had nothing left to fall back on when there was an emergency.”

Attendance secretary Robin Kimmelman believes the new policy is fair.

“The reason for the policy was to get students in on time so they don’t have attendance issues,” Kimmelman said.

Since the school year is still young, it’s too early to tell if the policy has helped in decreasing the number of absences.

Kimmelman believes that the new policy will help save time signing-in students, which will ultimately lead to students spending more time in class. The policy has yet to prove its effectiveness but as the months pass, numbers will show if the amount of lates by students is decreasing.

The new policy permits students to arrive late seven times per semester. The eighth tardy (explained or unexplained) will result in a Saturday detention. For any additional five tardies that occur in a semester, the student will receive another Saturday detention.

It is important to note the definition of an unexplained tardy, which occurs when a student is tardy without a note, or the office does not receive a call from a parent/guardian by 1:15 p.m. An unexplained tardy will result in after-school detention on the day of the tardy. All lates, whether explained or not, will count and could lead to serious consequences.

These changes could also motivate students to arrive to school on time as 10 tardies in a semester results in the loss of senior parking privileges.

“It’s a really big help, not just for me, but for all seniors, [on having a parking pass],” senior Daniel Joseph Venditti Jr. said. “It’s so much easier than taking the bus or having to get a ride to school. It is a huge benefit to have.”

This new set of rules also makes room for debate amongst students, parents, and school administrators as to whether it is fair or not.

History teacher Kathryn Donofrio believes the policy is fair.

“If you are constantly late, you are missing valuable instruction time in the classroom which will hurt your academic success,” Donofrio said.

Some students may not feel the same way as administrators regarding this issue, but this policy was implemented to motivate students to be on time, helping them reach their full academic potential.