A known sight around Huron has been the handheld green paper hallway passes seen everywhere in hallways and bathrooms. But a potential new hallway pass system is currently in the process of testing— the Rat Pass.
Rat Passes are digital alternatives to the green hallways passes commonly seen around the school. Like many schools across the country, Huron hopes that through a modernized digital pass system, academic success, as well as communication between students and parents can be reworked and further amplified. Class principle Jodi Bullinger leads the initiative regarding the application of rat passes in classrooms around Huron.
“The purpose of the Rat Pass is to render meaningful data to examine attendance patterns for students,” Bullinger said, “If all teachers are using the Rat Pass, we can see if a student is asking for a pass multiple hours and collaborate with the student’s trusted adults at home. Additionally, we are able to be more effective in knowing how long students are absent.”
With these new digital passes beginning to be placed online in Schoology, the duty of filling out and enabling passes falls upon students.
“The Rat Pass puts the responsibility on the student to fill out the pass, rather than the teacher,” math teacher Sara Serfozo said, “In my opinion, it is way less of a distraction and interruption than the old passes. It is less work for the teacher. It is also helpful, because CAs and Admin know what students are in the hallways. With the green passes, it is hard to keep track of that aspect.”
It is noted however, with eight required steps to be filled out each time, students have responded to the Rat Passes as less convenient.
“The new rat passes take longer to fill out, and are more complicated than just going up to your teacher to ask for a pass,” freshman Jenny Zhang said, “ I understand that teachers want to have a record of the people using passes during class, but going through the whole process of filling out the form, then going up to the teacher isn’t the most convenient way for the students.”
As of April 10, the Rat Passes are still being tested out in classrooms.
“Teachers have reported fewer students asking for a pass, that students are returning to class more expeditiously when they know that they are being held accountable for time, and fewer students outside their classrooms during class hours,” Bullinger said.
