The system of grabbing the hand-held colorful hall passes to use the bathroom, go to the nurse, or excuse yourself from class are over.

Next year it is a confirmed change to a digital and online system being used in place of our current hall passes.

This is how the new bathroom pass is going to work. The pass will consist of signing into your Chromebook, filling out a pass in Focus and submitting it to your teacher so they can approve you.

Once that is done and you are approved by your teacher, you head down to the bathroom to the iPads that will be managed and monitored by the hallway and bathroom monitors. 

You will get on the iPad and select your name and hallway, then the iPad will see if you have been approved by a teacher. The iPad tracks how many people are in the bathroom per hallway at that time. If there are too many people in your bathroom, you will be denied access until a spot opens up. If the hallway monitor sees that a student does not have a pass, they will escort them back to class.

This pass will also have an installed timer, seeing how long you take in the place you are supposed to be. If you overstay your time, the data is sent to administration of that school.

After the news spread throughout the school, many connected the dots to a system called “E-Hallpass.” While very similar, our next year passes will be run through the WSD Focus app which is already installed on your Chromebook.

Schools such as Holt and Timberland are already putting this system to the test. They were chosen as the two pilot schools and administrators are watching closely as they test it this quarter as to how we will do this.

Assistant principal Lindsay Kiely thinks enforcing these new passes will help with the current issues around school.

“We are enforcing this system to prevent meeting up, smoking/vaping, drama, and fights,” Kiely said.

Some students are worried this is a waste of time, an invasion of privacy, and won’t prevent anything. Others think that is a smart idea and will help our school with common struggles, and that it is a faster, cleaner and more advanced hallway system. 

“If you are doing the right thing, this shouldn’t change much, but if you are doing the wrong thing, this will make it easier for us to catch you,” Kiely said.

Many students and teachers have mixed opinions on the new focus pass system.

“I think that is a really bad idea. Teachers talk a lot about preparing you for college and the real world but then they inforce childish things like this,” Leah Dudley (11) said.

“What if there is an emergency? I’m not waiting for the bathroom to open up to simply go pee,” Bella Byrd (9) said. 

While students may not see the upside to this new pass, many teachers think this new pass with be a great way to keep students safe in an efficient way.

“I think it’s going to be great. I’m very excited, it’s going to limit how many students are out in the hallway,” teacher Katie Decker said.

Just like Decker, Matthew Eversole also thinks this pass could become efficient.

“I think the current pass is simple and efficient, but I think the new system will keep people safer,” Eversole said.

What is your opinion on coming back to school next year with digital hall passes? Sanitary and advanced? Or over the top and waste of time?