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Spring Hill High School – Attendance Policy

erik4678 — Sun, 09 May 2010 19:11:34 +0000

Spring Hill High School’s attendance policy is based directly on Maury County’s policy. The policy is fairly strict.

Students are only allowed to be absent for personal or family member illness, death in the immediate family (3 day max), extreme weather, religious observances (5 day max), or emergencies (at the principal’s discretion). The school even goes so far as to define immediate family member as: “spouse, children, parents, grandparents, brothers, sisters, mother-in-law, father-in-law, daughter-in-law, son-in-law, brother-in-law, and sister-in-law.” Defining immediate family and setting a maximum on absences seems harsh but must result from abuses to the system.

As opposed to Independence High School’s 5 allowed absences, Spring Hill does not allow pre-planned absences for family trips, etc.

When a student returns to school, they must bring a note signed by their parent or guardian explaining their absence. If the absence was due to a doctor or dentist appointment, faxed notes will not be accepted, and the note must include the name of the physician and the time of the appointment. The school may call to confirm.

Similar to Independence High School, if a student misses 10 consecutive days or 15 total days during a semester, they will lose their eligibility to get a driver’s permit and/or license. For further explanation, see my post: How Tennessee Driver’s License Laws Work.

For the full attendance policy, go to page 9 at http://www.mauryk12.org/SpringHillHigh/Syllabus%20etc/HB%20-%20Attendance.pdf

On a side note, here’s an interested except from the attendance policy:

“Mass exodus, early dismissal or late arrival of all students or any segment of students shall not be permitted for any reason except for emergencies, such as inclement weather or other unavoidable situations, unless instruction time is made up in full.”

With the advent of Facebook and Twitter and with so many people carrying internet-capable phones, it’s now easy for massive groups of people to quickly organize large gatherings or departures. Instead of meet-ups, these large, random gatherings are called “Tweatups”. I believe the excerpt above refers to something like tweatups where students are organizing mass tardiness or skipping. I thought you would like to be aware of this phenomenon.

Spring Hill High School – Dress Code

Spring Hill High School – Academics

Spring Hill High School – Bus Stops and Times

Spring Hill High School – Parent Portal

erik4678 — Tue, 04 May 2010 14:43:37 +0000

Similar to Williamson County’s ParentConnection, Maury County has online access to students’ info called “Parent Portal”.

Parent Portal provides access to your child’s attendance, schedule, grades, and discipline. The grades portion refers to end of the term grades; however, in the schedule section, you can click on “assignments” to see day-to-day grades. I’m certain the assignments section will have some lag time depending on the teacher’s workload and how quickly they can enter grades into the computer.

Parent Portal even goes one step further than ParentConnection and gives parents access to a student’s disciplinary info. Why shouldn’t parents know about their child’s discipline problems?

As I mentioned in an earlier post, I think these programs are just great. We don’t have our own kids yet, but if we did, I would certainly be checking my child’s info on a regular basis. In the past, parents and teachers seemed to have a closer relationship, making it difficult for students to get off track; nowadays, it’s hard to imagine a teacher calling home to chit-chat with parents, leaving parents in the dark.

Along with Parent Portal and ParentConnection, I would like to see a social networking type interface so that parents and teachers can stay in touch. In fact, it would be easy to set-up facebook groups for each class. Perhaps, as time passes, the very technology that isolated us from each other will bring us back together in online, and then offline, communities.

In order to get access to Parent Portal, you must contact the school to get a username and password. Then, to get on the site, go to http://www.mauryk12.org/ where you’ll see “Parent Portal” in red letters in about the middle of the page.

For more instructions, go to http://www.mauryk12.org/parent%20portal%20letter.pdf

Spring Hill High School – Dress Code

Spring Hill High School – Academics

Spring Hill High School – Bus Stops and Times

erik4678 — Sun, 02 May 2010 05:30:05 +0000

To find Spring Hill High School’s Bus Stops and Times, click here: Maury County – Bus Stops and Times

Spring Hill High School – Dress Code

Spring Hill High School – Academics

Spring Hill High School – Dress Code

erik4678 — Wed, 28 Apr 2010 16:25:07 +0000

The Spring Hill High School dress code seems tough and covers a wide range of issues. Here are some of the most interesting details:

Acceptable Attire in Maury County Schools

Pants, shorts, Capri pants, skirts, skorts, jeans, or jumpers in the colors of navy blue, black or any shade of khaki.
Shirts with short or long sleeves and a collar (polo, dress-style with buttons, or turtle neck), in the solid colors of white or navy blue.
All shirts should be properly buttoned and tucked inside of pants, shorts, skorts, or skirts.
Individual school may designate up to four additional colors for acceptable styles of shirts. SHHS’s four additional solid colors are Maroon (school color), Black, Heather Gray, and Khaki Tan.

If I’m reading this section correctly, all students must wear a white, navy blue, maroon, black, heather gray, or khaki collared shirt; they must wear navy blue, black, khaki, maroon, or heather gray bottoms; and, their shirt must be tucked in at all times. On the other hand, they allow jeans, shorts, and skirts.

I don’t know what your opinion is, but I would like to see a stricter policy. My thought is that it hard to think of yourself as a “thug” or “gangster” when you’re dressed nicely. Please comment below, and let me know your thoughts.

Here are few more notable items:

Full-length pants, cropped pants, and straight-legged capri pants are permitted. Pants, capri pants, and shorts must be dress style or casual-dress style (e.g., Dockers®). Jeans and/or pants must be straight-leg or boot cut.

Pants, shorts, skirts, and skorts with elastic waistbands must be worn at the waist and do not require a belt. All other pants, shorts, skirts, and skorts must be worn at the waist, and those with belt loops must be worn with a belt.

T-shirts with or without sleeves must be worn as undergarments. They must be solid white, navy blue, maroon (school color), black, heather gray, and khaki tan and may not display any writing, picture or images.

“Cargo” shorts or pants, or hooded garments are not permissible. This restriction does not apply to after-school activities such as athletic events.

Hats, bandanas, hood worn on head, sweatbands, curlers, rollers, gloves, and sunglasses will not be permitted except for medical reasons.

Extreme facial makeup that is disruptive to the educational environment will not be allowed.

For the complete dress code, look on page 20 of the Spring Hill Handbook.

Spring Hill High School – Bus Stops and Times

Spring Hill High School – Academics

Maury County Schools – Bus Stops and Times

erik4678 — Tue, 27 Apr 2010 14:40:29 +0000

Rather than an online map, Williamson County provides an online tool to find your bus stops and time based on your address. To use the tool:

1) Go to http://96.4.42.5/edulog/webquery/

2) Type in the number and street name of your address, for example “445 White Oak Trl”.

3) To the right, middle of the page, select your child’s grade.

4) Click “Go”

5) Finally, the trickiest step, you must click on the three digit number underneath “school code” in order to actually see the bus stop intersection and time.

Spring Hill High School – Academics

erik4678 — Mon, 26 Apr 2010 17:52:37 +0000

Number of Students	857
# of Teachers*	57
Student/Teacher Ratio	15 : 1

Attendance Rate	92.9%
Dropout Rate	11.4%
Graduation Rate	70.7%



No Child Left Behind**	Spring Hill	State Avg.
Math	5%	11%
Reading/Writing	5%	6%



ACT
Composite	19.6
English	19.4
Math	18.8
Reading	19.9
Science/Reasoning	19.8


Discipline
# of Suspensions	82
# of Expulsions	1



Economic
# of Economically Disadvantaged Students	265
% Economically Disadvantaged Students	30.92%

* This is only an estimate. On the school’s webpage, there’s a list of teachers, so I simply counted all the teachers. Student/Teacher Ratio doesn’t seem to be reported anywhere, which is quite irritating to me, since I’m certain that my clients will want this figure. Of course, not reporting this ratio makes sense because it can whip parents up into a frenzy of demanding new schools.

** No Child Left Behind measures the % of students who are below the standard, so it’s good to have a lower number.

Spring Hill High School – Bus Stops and Times

Spring Hill High School – Dress Code

Top 12 Value-Adding Home Improvements

erik4678 — Fri, 23 Apr 2010 15:28:20 +0000

Independence High School – ParentConnection

erik4678 — Fri, 16 Apr 2010 15:09:02 +0000

We don’t have our own kids yet (except for our furry kids), but if we did, I would be really interested in this program. With the rise of the internet, there’s no reason that parents shouldn’t have access to their child’s grades and attendance info.

Since I’m not a parent, I can’t get into the system to play around with it, but if I understand it correctly, parents should be able to view their child’s attendance and day-to-day grades, including homework and tests so that you’re not shocked at the end of the semester.

To me, there should be bells and whistles promoting the ParentConnection as a revolution in the potential fo parental involvement, but it’s inconspiculously tucked away as just another part of the school’s website.

In order to sign up, you’ll have to fill in a form and bring it in to the Independence Counseling Center. Then, you’ll be able to go online with you password and access the system. Everything you need is located at: http://www.wcs.edu/ihs/parentconnect.html

Independence High School – Medication Policy

erik4678 — Thu, 15 Apr 2010 14:17:46 +0000

Independence’s medication policy is fairly strict. For prescription and non-prescription medication, parents must fill out a form at the beginning of the year allowing the school nurse to administer it; they must also fill out a separate form for each medication; and, they must bring the medication to the nurse and sign it in, i.e., students are not allowed to bring any medication to school.

Particularly with prescription medication, failure to follow the above policies might result in a zero-tolerance offense. The punishment is a year suspension! Not too long ago, I remember seeing a news special about a high school student who was being severely punished for taking her birth control pills at school, making the zero-tolerance policy seem obtuse. On the other hand, I’ve also seen recent specials about the prescription pill epidemic, even among high school student. I suppose it’s difficult for teachers to know the difference between legitimate and illegitimate medication.

In my opinion, the zero-tolerance policy should prescribe different punishments based on whether the pill has the possibility for abuse or not; however, I wanted to be sure you know how strict the policy is.

The complete policy is available on page 24 at http://www.wcs.edu/ihs/attendance/forms/Handbook0910.pdf

Independence High School – Attendance Policy

erik4678 — Tue, 13 Apr 2010 15:50:29 +0000

Independence’s Attendance Policy seems fair but firm. The full attendance policy is page 10 at http://www.wcs.edu/ihs/attendance/forms/Handbook0910.pdf

From reading the attendance policy, I can tell that the school is trying to address some issues.

For example…if a student’s parents write a note a week in advance and the student has 95% attendance and a C average, then the school will allow an excused absence, up to 5 times per year. I don’t remember anything like this when I was young. Rarely, my parents would pull me out of school, but there wasn’t a specific policy allowing it. It seems evident that too many parents were pulling their kids from school, so the school decided to allow it so that they could regulate it.

Another example…typically, if a student is ill, then a parent can write a note from them; however, on exam days and days before and after a break, a doctor’s note is required. In this case, it seems evident that too many parents were writing sick notes to get an extra vacation day and that too many parents were writing sick notes when their child hadn’t prepared for an exam.

The attendance policy also seems to have harsher consequences than when I was young. According to state law, parent’s will receive a truancy letter after 3 unexcused absences and another after the 5^th. 10 unexcused absences seems to be where the courts start to get involved. For an explanation about how attendance ties in with a student’s learner’s permit, see my post: Learner’s Permit.