The district should allow juniors and seniors the opportunity to go out for food during their lunch.
According to the district's website, “leaving the building without permission is a serious offense. Going to a restaurant off campus or leaving early without permission from parents and the main office. Offenders will be suspended. This is considered a flagrant violation of school rules and regulations.”
One of the reasons the district feels this way is because most teenagers are not mature enough to take on that kind of responsibility. However, the students who maintain a 3.0 grade-point average or higher should be given the chance to show their maturity level.
Possible remedies for eating lunch are to serve appetizing foods or allow students who are responsible enough and have permissions from their parents and the school’s administration to leave for lunch. Parents could sign a “permission to leave” form that would be on file in the main office and subjected to denial if a student shows irresponsibility or her or his GPA drops.
Senior Nijah Coleman said, “Our school lunch is not that good and most of us seniors drive and keep our grades up, so I don’t see the problem with a system being in place for us to leave when we have the resources for it.”
I understand that having a steady flow of people coming and going from campus increases the risk of a stranger entering the building. A resolution for this would be to have a sign-in sheet at the main entrance with students’ names who have permission to leave.
“It would have to be some safety precautions in place, like we’d have to talk to the administrators,” Coleman said.
Juniors and seniors who do not return before the lunch period ends, should be placed on a probationary list. If this happens again, those students would lose this privilege. We shouldn’t try to take advantage of this to go home. We should leave, get lunch and return safely.
“I was a senior who could leave the building," teacher Leslie Spain said. "I do understand that you guys would like to. So therefore, I believe there should be a trial basis and allow students to leave twice a week, but the students have to report back to the school on time.
