Everyone gets sick at some point in the school year. Before, if a student was absent eight times from a class in semester they would lose credit.
Due to the need for students to be able to stay home sick and take a family vacation, changes were made to the old attendance policy. These changes allow a student to have the opportunity to keep credit in a class after eight absences as long as they make up work, cover material, and meet with an attendance intervention team.
With eight absences a student and parent schedule an appointment to meet with the attendance intervention team to create a plan to help the student get to school more often. Some plans include wake up calls to ensure the student arrives at school on time, or transportation for students who are unable to get to the bus or walk to school.
Even with the ability to travel to school students who are often sick find themselves in a sticky situation when it comes to missing school: should they rest and overcome illness, or go to school and struggle to stay focused? Either way the work must be done.
“It’s really stressful to decide if this is the kind of thing that I can push through and go to school, or if I need to stay home, but if I stay home I get behind,” sophomore Brielle Ament said.
Each teacher has their own way to deal with absent make-up work and lessons. Some teachers will, depending on the length of the absence, create an altered work packet to accommodate the student’s schedule, while others give all the work, homework and classwork to the student to make-up.
“Each situation is different and if a student has missed maybe a week then we can definitely work so that they are not so much in a hole and take out a few assignments,” history teacher Cameron Talley said.
While students may get some help from teachers, who relieve them from part of their make-up work, they are still often stressed over the numerous assignments that pile up from sick days.
“Sometimes it’s so stressful because if I stay home, I feel bad for missing school and being behind, but then I’m swamped with make-up work over the weekend,” Ament said.