Waking up in the morning is usually a struggle for many high school students. Following their morning routines, they have to sit in traffic or park at Wakeman and then hurry into school to avoid being tardy. But instead of being able to walk through the door that is most convenient to them, they are forced to walk around the building to enter through the front. 

These front doors are the only doors that stay unlocked all day. While the school attempts to do its best at keeping the students and faculty safe at all times, this one-door-only policy needs to change. 

At the beginning of each school year, students take a picture for the yearbook and receive a student identification card. Over the course of my high school career, I can confidently say that I have never once used my card. Instead of letting the card collect dust, I think this could be the perfect solution to the school entrance problem. 

Teachers are able to utilize their identification cards to get into any entrance by scanning them at door entrances. Although this option would be convenient for students, I recognize how creating scannable cards for every student could be pricey. 

Instead, students should be able to knock on the door, show their identification card to an adult on duty, and if valid, be let in. Teachers and staff should be required to participate in a rotation for monitoring the doors in the morning. This enables a trusted adult to allow legitimate students into the building. 

Since there are many possible entrances, only a few designated doors around the school would be assigned a teacher or security guard; the rest of the doors could remain locked. For example, there should be a door open at the cafeteria, the field house, the door by guidance and the side entrance of the building in the world language hallway. That is a total of 4 extra entrances.  That is a small enough number of entrances to easily monitor and a large enough number of entrances to help facilitate entering the school.  

To make entering the school as convenient and safe as possible, this new method of showing your identification card will solve both these problems. We can finally avoid the extra steps around the building, and maybe even reduce some of our tardiness.