Let’s pretend I’m finishing 8th grade, heading to EPHS next year with the goal of graduating while slacking off the maximum amount. How much and how often can I sleep and play through my classes and still get my diploma?
Luckily, I passed 8th grade math because this requires some calculations. To begin with, EPISD expects to have block scheduling next year, the ultimate arrangement for minimizing a student’s work load. In four years, taking 8 classes a year, I could get 32 credits. But, I only need 26 credits to graduate. Let’s see. I can fail 2 out of my 8 classes in both 9th and 10th grades, and 1 out of my 8 classes in both 11th and 12th grades.
That’s 6 out of 32 classes of free time, to fail with no consequences, no summer school necessary, no Saturday classes, no falling behind in credits. Right off the bat, 19 percent of my time can be wasted with no worry.
Do I need to spend all 81 percent of the remaining time actually working to get those 26 credits? No way! I’m going to spend the whole first semester every year doing absolutely nothing, and guess what? In each class I will get a free 50 for my grade. Then, I can get an 89 or higher the second semester and it averages out to a 69.5 (rounded to a 70) so that I get a full year’s credit.
So, I need to pass only 81 percent of my classes, but I only have to work half the year (50 percent of the time) to achieve that. This all adds up that I only have to make a decent effort 40.5 percent of my time through high school and I can still get my diploma. Almost 60 percent of high school can be goof off, socialize, play around, sleep, flirt, wander-through-the-halls time!
Wait, I forgot something. Those numbers assume perfect attendance, and I want to miss as much as possible without having to do a credit appeal. I think I’ll take my chances at missing 10 days a semester. Twenty days a year will go to staying home watching TV and texting my friends while they’re in class.
Let’s go ahead and add to these days two early dismissal days a year when we don’t do anything, the last day of school, about 3 days a year of TAKS testing that only require a couple hours of effort, and a day for assemblies and miscellaneous school business. Out of 180 school days, for 27 of them, I’ll either be absent or there doing nothing. I’ll say that’s another 5.5 percent effort off from the previous 40.5 percent.
I’ll be making an effort only 35 percent of the time through my four years of high school and still graduating. Wrong! That’s assuming that the teachers require me to stay busy the entire class period in each course that I’m needing to pass. On average, I’d say I will only have to work three-fourths of each class period (remember, only during the second semester) in order to get the 89’s that I need to bring up the 50’s from the first semester.
Without even factoring in some cheating and copying, my final figure of time required to be on task now has come down to 27 percent. If I look hard for other loopholes, second chances, free grades, absences that can be removed, etc…, I can be working smarter instead of working harder, and by staying busy (at most) only 25 percent of my time across four years of high school, I will slide through with exactly 26 credits, exactly a 70.0 GPA and be a proud Eagle Pass ISD graduate.
I can hear “Pomp and Circumstance” playing now.
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