I often find myself running through the halls two minutes after my first class’s scheduled start time, terrified my teacher won’t be as lenient that morning. After arriving to the room out of breath, I watch as students stream in every few minutes, disturbing the flow of the lesson each time they enter.
The common thread amongst myself and my late companions? We all drive ourselves to school and have to tackle student parking each morning at 8 a.m. Problems with parking are a constant gripe among students and are an issue the school and Town Transportation Board need to address together.
At the moment, student drivers have very limited parking options. The first—and one that many opt for—is to park under the numerous “No Parking 7 a.m. – 9 a.m.” signs posted on the streets surrounding the high school, risking a ticket and hefty fine.
The second—and much safer—option is to park farther from the school, risking a tardy mark. When I park far away from school, I miss up to five minutes of my first-period class. While this might seem inconsequential in the context of a 55-minute class, five minutes late daily is 25 minutes weekly, 900 minutes yearly, or a total of 15 hours missed over the course of a school year.
It’s unfair that an entire population of students must choose between risking a parking fine and missing three weeks’ worth of first-period classes. The school needs to orchestrate parking for its student drivers.
Considering these problems with student parking around the school, what surprises me most is that faculty have been afforded parking permits, proving the school’s ability to secure parking for members of its community. The Brookline Town Transportation Board has approved the allocation of parking passes for faculty totaling 192 parking spaces on the streets around the school. This number, while not even adequate for all employees of the high school, is representative of the disparity between parking for faculty versus that for students.
Those with the power to change this might argue that the high school provides viable transportation options for students, as it offers bussing for those living more than one and a half miles away, plus a T stop on campus. However, this logic ignores a large body of students.
While many do benefit from the bus service, it’s unreasonable to say that bussing is adequate for students who participate in after-school activities. As a student-athlete, I often hear teammates complain about receiving tickets or being late to practice due to distant parking. While student-athletes make up a quarter of the student population, these complaints aren’t limited to student-athletes. Affording parking for students who need to drive would eliminate one of many worries that student-club members, student-athletes and student-drivers face. A high schooler who is worried about a track meet, science quiz and picture day shouldn’t need to worry about being late or getting a parking ticket as well.
Others might argue that organizing student parking might encourage students to drive to school, raising the important issue of environmental impact. However, this argument misses the point of student parking passes altogether. Affording parking for students would be a matter of necessity, rather than convenience for students. The school has set a precedent of accommodation by necessity in club funding, which is managed by the school, and determined by an application process analyzing need. Parking passes could work in a similar way, so students who have no choice but to drive to school would be prioritized. In this way, the school could mitigate additional environmental impact by allowing students who are already driving to do so without the risks of missing class or receiving a ticket.
All this is to say that there is a massive problem with student parking around the high school. With the inevitability of students driving to school, something needs to be done about parking. Learning, building relationships and gaining life skills in the classroom should be the paramount concerns of every student at the high school, not parking.
Our school has no problem orchestrating the allocation of library cards, T passes and club funding for students, so why should parking passes be any different?
The school must recognize its students’ problems and take action. Rather than leaving students to fend for themselves parking in the morning, the school and Town Transportation Board need to collaborate to organize student parking and allow student drivers to focus on what’s really important every morning: school.
