It’s not unheard of when a student raises their hand for a hallway pass, and ends up never returning to class. This pattern has remained constant throughout the years, with the students typically having little to no repercussions as a result of their actions. It was starting to seem as if this pattern of skipping would remain everlasting, as students here have been exploiting the physical pass system for as long as we can remember.
However, the school has decided it’s time for a change. Now, we are out with the old and in with a new generation of passes. SmartPass, a new virtual pass system, has just recently been implemented here at Curtis. It restricts the time a student can spend outside of their classroom, and depending on where they are going, students are limited to a maximum of ten minutes each day with only being allowed at most two passes per day.
But among some people is one concern. Would the new online passes be any different from the offline ones in regards to stopping kids from not coming back to class? An anonymous faculty member disagrees, explaining their opinion that this new pass won’t stop kids who usually skip from skipping. “Kids in the hallway that aren’t supposed to be there are abusing the passes. It’s not passes that are the problem – It’s the kids who don’t have holes in their schedule that are cutting classes. They’re not being swept; they’re just roaming the halls.” They added, “I believe that the students taking passes are not the issue in the hallways and that the data that will be collected will show that most passes are given to good students who are not the problem.” Furthermore, when asked, many teachers think that the new SmartPass system takes away from the already little amount of time they have to teach when having to pause their lessons to create a virtual pass for their students.
Others view the addition of SmartPass as a blessing. According to Ms. Quiñones, everyone with access to SmartPass can see every student that is over their time limit and out with a digital pass. She expressed her fondness for the new system. “I like it because parents ask: Why is my child not doing well? Well, the kid’s out of the classroom for 10 minutes. When are they getting instruction?”
“It’s an efficient way of tracking who’s out of the class and for how long. From what I’ve seen, teachers who have used it think of it as a pretty good thing and would like to continue using it. I think it would only be a problem to use for teachers who aren’t technologically savvy,” says journalism teacher and dean, Mr. Danza, when asked why this policy was implemented in the first place.
Throughout the process of switching over to digital passes, there is one thing that remains clear: the success of SmartPass as a whole ultimately depends on how students and teachers choose to follow it.
