Due to the state mandate of Illinois, all upcoming seniors will be required to choose between off-campus lunch and early or late arrival.

The state mandate requires that students have 300 minutes of school time each day. This equals five hours a day. These 300 minutes can include study hall. The current seniors have 380 minutes a day including lunch.

This change is non-negotiable and is uniform to all four schools in the district. The change will remain enacted unless the school day changes. An example of these changes would be a mandatory study hall or an eight period day. Any changes would need to be brought up and presented to the district school board and approved.

“I don’t like giving bad news to kids. Going back to that day, you juniors were all very mature in the way you handled yourselves. It makes me smile when I’m around all the juniors because they are such a classy bunch of students. I appreciate that and don’t take that for granted,” Principal Ross Draper said.

Next year a senior can receive off-campus and early or late arrival if the student takes early-bird, which is a gym period before school. This period would count towards the 300 minutes a student needs throughout the school day, giving the opportunity to take both off-campus and early or late arrival.

Currently, off- campus is scheduled two days out of the school week, with any additional days based off of SAT and ACT scores. To receive off-campus, a student must have at least a 3.5 GPA and three or less level one offenses. Warnings do not count towards this. Students will be taken off the list for 90 days if they do not meet these requirements.

Early and late arrival are scheduled every day of the school week, and the only requirement for it is that the student will be receiving all of the credits needed for that semester. Early release means the student’s school day would end after sixth period, and late arrival students would start after first period is over.
“I am going to get late arrival so I can sleep in the morning,” junior Don Oliver said.
This change is not supposed to affect any local businesses as there are still students who will be receiving off-campus lunch.

Likewise, this change will not have any impact on the lunch administrators and staff.
Administrators are looking for different ways to make lunch different for seniors. An example might be seniors sitting outside for lunch.