MHS notes decline in students’ absences

The implementation of more stringent attendance policies is beginning to reflect on Marianas High School’s student performance, disclosed MHS Principal James Denight yesterday, noting a steady decline in the high school’s absentee rate over the last couple of years.

For the first quarter of the ongoing academic year, Mr. Denight cited Saipan’s lone public high school has recorded an absentee rate of less than five percent or not more than 90 of close to 1,900 high school seniors across all grade levels.

The school recorded its highest rate a few years back with 15 to 18 percent of students failing to report to class.

“MHS is pleased with this attendance record. It has been going down steadily. The end of the last quarter last year, we noted below 6 percent of absentees among students,” said Mr. Denight.

A stronger partnership between educators, students, and parents has contributed to the remarkable improvements at the public high school, according to the principal.

“We’re working much closer with parents. Since last school year, we’ve had some 400 parent-teacher conferences and meetings. Plus the enforcement of stricter attendance policies where we hold students personally accountable for their attendance. . . it seems to be working,” Mr. Denight said.

The recent establishment of block scheduling at MHS has also stirred significant improvements in the students’ enthusiasm toward learning.

According to the administrator, students seem to have developed more interest in their studies.

“They are definitely more concerned and much more attentive to attending school. We hope to sustain their interest from here on,” said the principal.

The block schedule, an alternative form of class scheduling which MHS has embraced since the beginning of the school year has reportedly drawn positive feedback from the high school community.

The non-traditional class scheduling which is utilized by 50 percent of mainland schools seems to be in tune with the demands of both the students and teachers, according to the MHS administrator.

“We have gained a lot of positive feedback from both teachers and students about this scheme. It has contributed to more student interest in school, better student-teacher communication, more interaction, and teachers have more time to be pay individual attention to each student,” Mr. Denight explained.

Block scheduling allows students more hours to absorb knowledge they acquire in the classroom as they are given approximately 95 minutes to spend for one period.

School officials have cited many advantages to the scheme mainly pointing out that four years of high school could be shortened to three years or less as students would have more flexibility to complete a 180-day required subject in 90 days. It is also projected to maximize the use of students’ time by finishing high school earlier than expected.

The new schedule has lessened the burden on MHS teachers who normally handle over a hundred students a day under the traditional form of scheduling.

Previously, teachers usually had an average of six teaching loads per day handling over 150 students. Under the current setup, teachers take on a maximum of three classes per day, with enough time to conduct one-on-one interaction with 60 students.

During the last school year, MHS was organized with a six period instruction, where the length of each period lasted 50 minutes and an allotted five minutes for changing classes.