Among seniors, the anticipation of driving to school and parking at the student lot with all of your friends is a very passionate topic. But with the parking pass lottery system, not many people get to enjoy this perk of being a senior. To apply for and receive a pass, you must complete a form that instructs you to list your extracurriculars. Naturally, the thought behind this is that your extracurriculars will be considered. However, many seniors who play a sport, are part of clubs that require after-school attendance and have after-school jobs or internships, did not get a passes this fall.
This proves that the “well-organized lottery” the school believes it has is unfair. Furthermore, many seniors who live close to the school were lucky to have received parking passes, while those who live further away were not as fortunate.
When considering how to make this lottery system fair and somewhat accessible to all, a few changes must be made. The school needs to consider the locations of people. This means prioritizing those who live further away. This isn’t suggesting that those who live close by shouldn’t receive a pass, but rather that the school should spread them out more and make distance a factor when assigning them.
In addition to that, extracurricular activities are important as they help build an intriguing college application. In order to arrive at those extracurriculars on time, the school must consider them when distributing parking passes. Students won’t be able to successfully get to their extracurricular activities if they do not acquire a parking pass. So when making seniors list their extracurriculars on the form, take it into consideration.
Some people simply applied so that they could drive to and from school with no other obligations before or after school, yet they got a pass. While others who are a part of a WJ sport and have after-school jobs have to trek the long journey to Davis Library and hope they make it to work on time.
There are circumstances in which some people have family obligations. For example, some might have to help their parents with grocery shopping or drive their siblings around, in addition to attending jobs for the aid of the family. These obligations deserve priority over anything else. While the school includes a part in the form to elaborate on family obligations, they often do not take it into consideration. Those who write in that box should be prioritized.
The seniors who received a parking pass this semester might think that the current system is fair, but they are biased. There are prominent flaws in the way the system works and even those who got a pass should be able to see that.
Our school is incredibly overpopulated, and until we split with Woodward, not everyone will receive a parking pass. But even with that, there are ways to make the parking pass lottery fair, even with our approximately 735 seniors.
There is little to do now that seniors have already gotten their parking passes or have received the email saying they are not granted one. But for the second semester and future years, the lottery must change to create a more fair and accessible opportunity for seniors to make an even more enjoyable senior year.
