Can I ask you a question about school policy?

Wesley Harrison Editor-in-Chief

State capacity is defined as the ability of a government to make and implement policies. Governments with a low capacity are considered weak or failed states.

Policies are not effective if they are not properly enforced. This is a universal truth spanning from governments to families. It is also true at Marietta High School. If the school doesn’t start enforcing its policies, then it can be considered a failed state.

There is a significant lack of policy sharing and distribution within the school. For example, the vending machines are disabled during the third block, however, there are still lines spanning the width of the hallway waiting for the vending machine during the block.

The lack of effective policy implementation affects students’ ability to learn and teachers’ ability to instruct. When groups of students are late, teachers have to restart instruction from the beginning in order to effectively all their students.

However, overly harsh policymaking can cause the policy to be overall ignored. The tardy rules in the 2021-22 school year are an example of this, students would be given punishments for every class they were late to such as going to after-school or Saturday school tutoring. Teachers implemented this policy less because it took their class time to implement this change.

School policy is a scale that rolls between solving problems and causing them. Students cannot effectively learn when a large amount of policies

This leaves me with this question: how can policy be effectively implemented without causing greater harm to students or teachers?

I think there is a happy medium to be had. The hall passes are an example of this. Teachers write students a hall pass whenever they need to leave class, however, this is not possible for all teachers depending on how much students need to be outside of class. For example, Josh Dempsey has printed production passes that allow his students to go wherever they need to be on campus to film because film students can’t produce the best product when tied to the physical classroom.

The school’s insistence on enforcing the policy, while also allowing teachers to make their own changes to the system while adhering to it, allows the policy to function and keep more students out of the hallway during class time.

“The best public policy is made when you listen to the people who are going to be impacted,” said Elizabeth Dole, former U.S. Secretary of Transportation.

The school needs to listen to both the students and teachers about problems they experience with policies at the school. We are the ones that are impacted by the policies they set.

Policy is not a one size fits all situation. The school needs to implement more policies that teachers can change, within reason, in order to fit their needs.

Agree? Disagree? Let me know on Instagram @mhspitchfork or email pitchfork@ marietta-city.k12.ga.us.