Gather the Herd: School’s new tardy system in action

Manteca High attendance clerk Gina Menasco (right) helps Tyler Watkins. Under the new tardy policy, late students no longer need to check in at the front office and receive a tardy slip. Instead, they can go right to class. (MOISES RAMOS)

By MARIAH RAMIREZ
The Tower

The Manteca High study body has racked up approximately 50,000 tardies in the last two years.

As a new school year has arrived, along with new leadership, a revamped tardy system has since been initiated by Manteca High vice principal Brett Lewis.

Since the return to campus from COVID, tardies and absenteeism have been a major concern at Manteca High.

In 2021-22, the total number of students being tardy is about 23,000. The number of tardies soon went up by 1,000 in the 2022-23 school year.

Under the old tardy system, staff would lock the gates soon after the morning bell, which forced the students to travel to the office from where they originally were. Tardy students would need to get a pass before heading to class. Sometimes, because of the process, students would lose 10-15 minutes of instructional time.

“We’ve realized that students were missing a lot of instructional time and time in the classroom, getting a slip, and getting to class. We’ve tried to cut down on that, so the gates are now open about 10 minutes after the bell rings, in hopes of students getting to class quicker. Students don’t have to go through the office anymore to get a slip, they would just go straight to class.”

Now, however, the new tardy system has the student’s education in mind.

“The tardy system is going to be effective because we would have a lot of students in the office every morning and it would take a long time to get everybody slips. And me, you know, we saw students missing 10-15 minutes of class just trying to get their slip.”

Lewis believes the new system will be effective because it has the student’s learning and instructional time in mind.

With the revamped system, there will be an adjustment for staff on campus. Teachers will no longer receive a slip when a student is late to class.

Carol Crieghton is in her 11th year of teaching. She has leaned on the tardy slip to help track her attendance.

“If someone comes in late and doesn’t have a tardy slip, and I’ve already taken attendance, I will probably forget to mark them tardy. I don’t think the tardy system is really any different from what we did before.”