Have you ever thought that the bathroom policy at Rolla High School is inconsistent amongst the teachers? Bathroom passes are given out at the teacher’s discretion, as said in the student hand book, and this turns into a problem with some students. On average, teachers give students four passes per semester for both late assignments and bathroom usage. Since students are only given a limited number of passes, they may abuse classroom time in an hour where they know the teacher allows bathroom breaks.

This problem might be avoided if teachers allowed students to use the bathroom during free time in class. A reason why teachers possibly give out only a few passes that include extra credit points, homework passes, hall passes, and bathroom passes is to limit the amount of time students are out of class so that more material is taught, and so that students have a fair amount of extra credit points at the end of the semester if they choose not to use their passes.

A main issue with a limited number of bathroom passes is that you can’t exactly control the call of nature. The only benefit to not having that many passes is that holding it is an incentive for more bonus points at the end of the semester. Lunch is really the only logical time to go because five minutes between classes doesn’t give you enough time to navigate the crowded halls, go to your locker, use the bathroom, and then sprint to your class, hoping you’re not tardy; especially when tardies are so strictly enforced this year with sweeps.

Students at Rolla High School understand that it’s not acceptable to abuse class time, but students shouldn’t be punished with a tardy because they had to use the bathroom after holding it all day. A way this problem could be fixed is that if teachers do have time at the end of the hour, or before they plan to lecture at the beginning of the hour, they let students quickly use the bathroom, as long as they don’t abuse the privilege.

Since a semester is ninety school days, it’s pretty unreasonable that students are only given the opportunity to use the bathroom four times without getting tardy. Teachers sometimes have bathroom passes in the form of objects and you can take them and just go at a logical time, like in the band and choir rooms.

Basically, we can use the restroom once a month. Most students save their passes just in case their grade drops and they need that extra boost of twenty points, or if they have a late assignment. Unless it’s a complete emergency, no one’s going to sacrifice five extra credit points just for the bathroom.

The general assumption that students go to the bathroom to text or to just roam the halls isn’t fair to students who do actually have to use the bathroom, and shouldn’t be limited on passes just because some students may or may not abuse their bathroom privileges. It is hard to gauge the problem fully and fairly though, without subjecting some of the students to a certain policy and not the rest, which is why teachers on average might give out only four passes in their class.

To kick things off in hopes of changing the bathroom policy or just getting the subject on the table, Rolla High School’s bathroom policy is inconsistent and needs to be looked at a bit more thoroughly. If students were given passes for homework, hall, and extra credit points all in one, and a few bathroom passes, the problem might be fixed.