Crenshaw High Is Praised for Tardy Policy

Can anyone tell me what is wrong with Crenshaw High School demanding that its students be in class on time (“Crenshaw High Tardy Policy Gets Poor Grade From Some,” June 5)? This is invaluable training for the outside world where punctuality is a basic requirement to obtain and hold a job.

Does Jacinto Rhines think he is doing his daughter a service by attempting to undermine the school that is trying to teach her this virtue? Will Mr. Rhines also file a lawsuit against an employer who fires his daughter for being repeatedly late to work?

Tardy students interrupt the educational process for everyone else in the class. Why aren’t parents like Mr. Rhines putting their energy into teaching their children the value of promptness? Why don’t they spend a week at Crenshaw High School with their children, showing them how it is possible to travel from Class A to Class B in a timely fashion? Better yet, show them how to be in their seats with their pencils sharpened and ready to learn when the tardy bell rings.

I feel it is Mr. Rhines, not Crenshaw High School, who is practicing “miseducation.” Why is he dragging race into this? If “black kids are disproportionately suffering,” it probably means that black kids are disproportionately late to class. How wonderful that the principal, Yvonne Noble, and the assistant principal, Yolanda Anderson (both of whom are black) care enough to do something about an unfortunate situation. Mr. Rhines should thank his lucky stars that his daughter is in a school that’s doing its best to impact her in a positive way.

There’s a simple message here: If you care that much about your child’s education, make sure that she (or he) is on time to class! Then, everyone wins.

CHERYL CROSS

Santa Monica

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As an educator in the Los Angeles Unified School District I have plenty of experience dealing with tardy students. The litigants don’t understand the impact that chronically late students have on the educational process.

Students who arrive 10 or 20 minutes after the beginning of class disrupt learning in several ways. When they arrive late to class, the students who arrived on time are distracted from the lesson: I must stop teaching and change tardy students’ status in my roll book.

Eventually, I’ll have to reiterate material to tardy students covered before their arrival, which reduces the amount of time I have to present new information to the responsible majority of the class.

The bottom line: Youngsters lose hours of instructional time over the course of an academic school year because of those irresponsible students who arrive late.

Additionally, the parents’ attorney (Phillip Higgins) states that “black kids are disproportionately suffering” as a result of Crenshaw High School’s tardy policy. Such policies must be enforced regardless of race or ethnicity and not because too many students from a particular group get in trouble.

Have Mr. Higgins and his clients forgotten that black students are among those losing a small piece of their collective education every time a teacher must stop to deal with a tardy student?

Has he forgotten that young people learn to be responsible through the enforcement of rules?

Has Mr. Higgins forgotten how consequences for failing to comply with rules contribute to personal growth, as students learn which behaviors are unacceptable?

Jacinto Rhines, Alexis Watson and Phillip Higgins, may I suggest that you use your energy to fight “real” injustice instead of interfering with a school system that is desperately trying to educate and socialize your youngsters.

ELLIOT STILLMAN

Venice

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Have the parents of students at Crenshaw High who are protesting the school’s policy on tardiness and absence considered that such behavior is rude and inconsiderate to both the teacher and the other students in the class?

This kind of behavior, if not corrected in high school, is liable to continue when the student gets a job--and it certainly continues (with negative effects) if that student goes on to places of higher education. As a community college teacher, I can attest to the fact that such conduct is widespread. At this level, students who are in school to learn become indignant when others casually stroll into class five to 15 minutes late, and interrupt with impunity whatever activity is under way. Occasional tardiness or absence is understandable, but habitual tardiness or absence should be corrected before the young adults come to believe it is acceptable behavior.

EDYTHE M. McGOVERN

Los Angeles