The halls of White Station are usually packed to the brim with thousands of students trying to make their way to class; however, limited time and a large campus make that job difficult for many students.  

Mr. Bateman assigned his World History class a project where they had to create their own Declaration of Independence and found that most talked about how unfair the tardy system is.

Mr. Bateman heard these concerns but wants his students to understand why the tardy protocols are important.

“Your job tells you when to be there. Movies tell you. Concerts tell you. You know when people stop at a red light, that’s society teaching you that being on time and doing the right thing is important,” Bateman said.

One of Mr. Bateman’s students shared his insight on where he thinks the root of the problem lies.

“The campus is too big. If you time yourself going from the senior gym to the freshman building, you probably wouldn’t even make it in five minutes,” Malik Blackburn (12) said.

Blackburn feels that constantly being out of class has a large impact on student performance because the long line that students have to wait in to collect of tardy slip forces them to miss even more instructional time.

With a school this size, keeping up with tardies has proven to be a difficult task. A new software program has been installed that aims to minimize tardiness and limit time out of the classroom.

“It’s [tardiness] gotten a whole lot better since we got Raptor,” Mr. Bouldin said.

Raptor, the new program, will help keep track of those students who are regularly tardy so administrators can help them find better ways of being on time.

Administrators are still trying to get Raptor to work alongside Powerschool. Once that happens, staff will be able to record tardies in a more efficient way.