Dear Editor,

In recent years, Shelby County has enacted strict policies on school attendance. Having five or six tardies can tally up to one Saturday School. Once a student reaches that point, any more tardies could lead to even harsher consequences, such as suspension in extreme cases.

It makes sense that students would want to protect their sacred weekends off by showing up to school on time. But even with good intentions, a bad day of traffic could land you with a tardy.

At Pelham High School, this is a much too frequent problem.

Traffic jams of parents dropping off their kids, students trying to make it to their parking spots, and parents trying to speed off to work create one massive problem. There have been reported accidents in front of the school as a result. There is nothing at the entrance of the school to direct traffic.

Only one police officer steps in to control the flow, and this is only on the first day of school. After that, the chaos begins. Kids are late to school, parents are late to work, and sometimes an unfortunate driver will find themselves wedged in the middle of traffic while waiting on police to report the accident.

Yet all of this is easily solvable. Traffic light, anyone? By adding a traffic light, there would be no need for a police officer to direct cars. There would be a system to getting in and out of the school without frequent fits of road rage. There would also be less risk of accidents, which is the most important.

It’s a simple solution that would improve the lives of every student just trying to get to school.

Jennifer Payne

Pelham