Students and teachers had to deal with many changes from last school year, and this year is no different. Following the school year back from the pandemic, there have been many changes in South Lakes including the addition of Electronic hall (E-hall) passes. 

E-hall passes are used to keep track of students when they leave their classrooms to go to the bathrooms, office, and anywhere else outside of class. This includes when students go from one place to another during lunch. For example, a student would need to get a pass if they want to go from the cafeteria to the library and vice versa.

Anytime a student passes the 5-minute mark, the pass turns red and when it passes the 10-minute mark, it alerts the admin in the building prompting them to look for the student. If a number of students are out of class, the E-hall pass website locks the passes so that teachers can’t let students leave.

With this new addition, students have expressed their thoughts regarding the passes. There have been mixed feelings from both teachers and students regarding whether or not the passes are really necessary.

“I feel in the middle about it because, sure, it’s disruptive but also anytime I used to go to the bathroom there would be so many people lined up because some people are just hanging out in the stalls. But now, at least when I go I know the bathrooms aren’t completely full and I don’t have to wait to use the bathroom,” senior Urooj Khattak said.

Some students feel as though it’s unnecessary to do the whole process of waiting to get your pass approved and your teacher stopping the class to approve your pass. Not only does the whole process interrupt the class, but it also takes up a lot of class time for the teacher to approve and end it when the student comes back. Another thing is that when students need to go, some still need to pull out their laptops to get on the website and get the pass started for the teacher to approve it. 

“I feel like it interrupts class time and takes forever,” senior Victoria Salgado says, “It’s annoying having to do it because teachers don’t even pay attention to their computers.” 

On the other hand, some teachers feel that it’s easier for students to not disappear when they’re leaving to go to the bathrooms. Last school year some students would leave for more than 10 minutes and even disappear until the bell rang.With the new system, someone would be able to find these students before they could go for that long.

Physics teacher Pallow Parajuli explains, “The reason I like E-hall passes is because I think it deters students from going out and about randomly. The system is also easy to use like I can see how many students went out, how many passes I give in the day, and it’s a way to track movement- which I like.” 

While there are many different perspectives on the E-hall pass system, South Lakes High School continues to use these new procedures as it can benefit for the safety of all students.