School: a place where students should be welcomed in, not locked out.

The struggles that come with an average day of school are hard enough. A normal day now includes difficult tests, loads of homework and social stress. So when it is a challenge to get into the one place that you don’t really want to be, sometimes you just want to get back in your car and drive home.

For those students at Quince Orchard who are lucky enough to have a car to drive to school and a parking pass to park on the lower level, it is unfortunate that when they get to school they are locked out if they are late. What is the point of offering parking and having the doors ten feet from the parking lot if the doors are just going to be locked?

Keeping a school as large as QOHS safe is hard to do, and the efforts put into making sure everyone who is in the building truly belongs there are greatly appreciated. But when it gets to the point that the people who are expected in the building are kept out as well, then problems arise.

If someone really wanted to get into the building they would find a way; the lower level locked doors would not be the moat keeping the bad guys out.

Keeping the doors locked is also an attempt to curb tardiness, but getting to class late is better than not getting there at all. The extra barrier may actually make the late later, as students either struggle to get someone inside to open the door or walk to an inconveniently-placed, unlocked one.

Meanwhile, the doors don’t discriminate between the over-sleepers and the students who have legitimate excuses, such as a doctor’s appointment. But when students are trying to do the right thing and are just greeted by locked doors, they figure, why even bother?