About a month ago, Senior Charlie Collin went to Joey’s Pizza to grab some lunch. When he got back to school, he learned that as a result of this little trip, he will be losing every free period for the rest of the year along with multiple days of in school suspension. For the remainder of a senior year, Charlie must show up to a first period study hall everyday instead of being able to skip it and get more sleep. 

The punishment for the first offense of leaving campus is a 4-Hour after school detention. While this punishment may seem like a lot, many agree that it is fair for the school to enforce. “I think the 4-Hour detention was pretty fair after leaving campus for the first time,”  said Charlie Collin, but even Ms. Fransen, a veteran teacher at Hall High School, agreed that the punishment for the second offense was “a little steep”. 

As we all know Hall is a closed campus school. This means students cannot leave the school campus during the day. When students are caught leaving, they are usually given detention or an in-school suspension. These punishments have left many students feeling angry as they feel they should be allowed to leave at their own discretion. 

Even though Hall has had a strict close campus policy for at least the past 15 years according to student resource Officer Sanford, Students have noticed that the school is becoming more vigilant. “It seems like they’re putting way more effort into catching people this year than last year,”  said Charlie Collin. In previous years, security was limited to using security cameras and monitoring common entrances to the school in order to catch people leaving. 

This year, they have been tasked with patrolling on and off campus in cards and waiting outside to catch people attempting to re-enter the school. Some of this duty has even been put on teachers as they have been given the job of sitting in the hallways to monitor students and making sure they don’t leave.

Hall has been a closed campus since the beginning. Hall administration worried that opening the campus would allow drugs and other illegal substances to enter the school. With drug and substance use already being a problem at hall they say that opening the campus would only add to the issue. 

A legal concern with an open campus is the result of an accident that may happen if students leave campus. As it stands the school is responsible for the students at all times when they come to school. 

A car accident for example would leave the school liable and lead to major legal problems. Along with those two issues the third reason is that they do not want students skipping class. If students were allowed to leave the school it would increase absences. 

Ms. Fransen also believes that it could be an equity issue. “Only students with cars or transportation would be able to leave anyway,” she said. it might be unfair to students that are forced to stay on campus while their friends can leave.

Many faculty and students at Hall believe that the open campus is a good idea that the school should endorse.  Ms. Fransen was asked about the issue and stated that she was “not opposed” to the idea of an open campus. She went on to talk about all the positives to an open campus; Allow flexibility, maturity, privilege, independence, reward for good choices and behavior, help with congestion issues in library/cafeteria, support businesses in community. Officer Sanford, the school resource officer, does not believe an open campus would be a safety issue as long as students are held accountable. 

Some even worry that the policy is in place in order to make the cafeteria more profitable, which the school is not afraid to do based on the strict vending machine and school store snack rules.

There is one option suggested by Officer Sanford where students would need to sign out when they would be leaving and where they are going and if any rules were broken there would be severe punishments, but this is a district rule so it is up to the Board of Education to decide how Hall’s campus is operated. 

The school deals with the problem of drug use and absences every day, so it is important for them to work to reduce these instances. Whether or not having an open campus helps is tough to say, but it is not likely that any changes will be made in the near future despite student efforts.