Starting the second semester of the 2018-2019 school year, the way that parents are notified for unexcused absences changed. Deans used to call students down themselves and give them a reasonable punishment. A change has been made to the policy and the parents are now notified via automated phone calls. There are two phone calls that go out each day: one in the morning and another in the afternoon.

Associate Principal for Students and Staff, Karen Taylor talks about how they came to make a change to this policy.

“The administrative cabinet, which is the principal, the associate principals and the deans. We collectively talked about the need for this. Mr. Schwartz was a strong proponent of figuring out a way to make it happen, so we worked cooperatively with our counterparts at Downers Grove North and then the technology people at the district office and made it happen,” Taylor said.

Parent Barbara Kattke, thinks that this new change is helpful and beneficial.

“I think that it is beneficial for parents to know more immediately whether or not their child is in school. Currently, an email is being sent at some point during the day, but some parents are not able to check their email on a regular basis throughout the day. Finding out your child is absent sooner is more preferred. That gives the parent more time to find out why they have not gone to school. So yes, I think that it is helpful to parents as well as students,” Kattke said.

Senior Maria Ruiz thinks that this change is not a good idea because sometimes it is inaccurate.

“I don’t think that it is a good idea because sometimes attendance is not accurate. Sometimes teachers forget to take attendance or there is a mistake,” Ruiz said.

Senior Jacqueline Alcantara believes that this new change will be beneficial for students.

“I think that the majority of people would say they don’t like it because now it is easier for parents to know whether or not they missed school on purpose or ditched class. Personally, although, I know this is an unpopular answer, I like the unexcused phone call policy because I think that it keeps students on track. For example, I would want to know if one of my siblings was ditching,” Alcantara said.

Being the beginning of the semester, there aren’t a lot of reactions out yet. Taylor believes that it will have a positive effect on students.

“Yes, I anticipate that it will. We are just in our third day now of using it, but the goal is that it will have a positive effect,” Taylor said.

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