This year, SCHS administrators implemented attendance awards to cut the school’s truancy in half and encourage students to succeed academically.

Besides increasing home visits and conferences to enforce better attendance, administration plans to reward students who are doing the right thing, Vice Principal of Attendance and Discipline, Terry Flora said. There will be two different awards handed out to students who have received no tardies and no absences.

One of the awards will be for the first quarter, awarded to freshmen and sophomores with perfect attendance. They will receive decorative stickers for their Chromebooks. Only these two grades were chosen for the award because they recently were issued Chromebooks, Flora said.

“It’s a small gesture to show appreciation for the students making an effort,” Flora said.

The second award will be eligible to all grades for no absences and tardies in the month of October. According to Flora, this is often the month of frequent absences. The PTSA and administration will be making fried Oreos and handing them out for free to all students with perfect attendance.

“Making fried Oreos is a small price to pay to encourage students to succeed,” Flora said.

One of the students who received perfect attendance for the first quarter, sophomore Sandy Laine Caluya, believes attendance awards are a great way to motivate students.

“Missing school means falling behind in the schoolwork,” Caluya said. “It’s harder to bring your grade back up if you fall behind.”

Flora believes that attendance is the first step to academic success. The administration wants all the students to be career and college ready, and they hope these awards will help motivate students to do so.

“I’ve never met a student who graduated and did not attend school,” Flora said.