A student is sitting in class and is very hydrated and needs to go to the bathroom so the student begins to fill out a pass but then E-hall pass says “maximum capacity of students at location.” Is the frustration with waiting for E-hall pass approval worth the benefits? 

E-hall pass, for those who don’t know, is the system New Hartford uses for students to request permission to go to locations outside of their designated classroom. Examples include bathrooms, library, testing center, etc. Students can fill out a pass on their phone or chromebook and it has to be approved by a teacher–unless the teacher has the auto pass setting turned on so students can make it on their own and start and stop the pass. Then once started, E-hallpass times the person until they return to the original location. Students or the teacher– depending on the settings– hit  stop.

Sounds easy, right?  But Tommy Vitagliano, a senior at New Hartford high school thinks it is frustrating when you can’t make a pass. Yes always was Tommy’s response to if teachers seem frustrated when you make a pass. Tommy says “Get rid of it.”

Mr. Ryan, a teacher at New Hartford High School has his pass settings set to auto pass which means students can make a pass on their own. When asked if E-hall pass distracts the class? Mr. Ryan answered with “Sometimes it does because they can’t get it to work” but he would rather have an E-hall pass than nothing at all.

Dean at New Hartford High School, Mr. Romanow, explains the benefits of E-hallpass.

“Unlike paper passes, E-hall passes keep a log of all passes and creates a database for me to look through so I can notice trends and patterns,” said Mr.Romanow.

Mr. Romanow uses the information from E-hallpass to monitor hallway traffic and to identify students who are missing too much instruction because they are wandering the halls. He says typically the school  follows a progressive discipline policy: students who abuse pass privilege first receive  a warning and if the problem keeps occurring they will receive after school detention. 

“In most cases, after a warning or pass restrictions, students go where they are supposed to,” Mr. Romanow said.

Mr. Ryan thinks if a kid abuses their pass privileges,they  should have their privileges taken away from them. 

My opinion is that E-hall pass is achieving the goal of fewer students wandering around the school but also has some problems. Students not being able to go to certain places due to capacity which the number of students could be increased but that would just undo the goal of less students wondering. Also, if more teachers like Mr.Ryan had their settings to auto pass then it could not distract teachers giving instruction or students taking a test. E-hall pass is better than what the old system of paper passes was because a teacher would have to take time out of class to handwrite a pass. Overall, I believe that E-hall pass could be quicker and easier, but it is better than going back to the past of using paper passes.