Convenience vs. safety: Why EIS students and faculty are divided over IDs 

Many schools across the United States are moving to a system that uses ID cards for students to scan in for many reasons. First, ID card systems can track who can have access to certain points inside the building and the whole school. Secondly, it can keep track of who comes in late to school or who is absent, making the job easier for teachers and secretaries. 

One benefit of having student IDs is being able to tell who is authorized on the premises. EIS Principal, Mrs. LaNova Schall, said, “ID cards improve safety by allowing staff to immediately identify who belongs on school grounds and ensuring that only authorized individuals are gaining access. When every student wears their ID around their neck, it creates a transparent environment where we can account for everyone’s presence during the school day.” 

Furthermore, in a crisis situation, IDs allow first responders to quickly identify and account for every student and ensure that everyone is safe. It also allows emergency personnel to move students to safety without confusing other people.

With many benefits as ID cards bring, there are always flaws in the system. First, many students across Edison Intermediate School (EIS) feel that the new lanyards do not look good and are not very durable. EIS eighth grade student Alex Contract said, “The colors they give us are bad, and the lanyards are cheap and break easily.” 

Many students at EIS claim that their lanyards break easily, and knowing middle school kids, it would not be surprising if they lose their ID cards. Because of this, the school could lose unnecessary money due to replacing IDs and lanyards. Another concern of many is that some students forget to bring their IDs. Mrs. Kimberly Swenson, an eighth grade ELA teacher at Edison who scans people’s IDs in the morning, said: “Most kids have them, maybe ten percent of kids don’t bring them, but most of them do not have them readily available and keep them in their pockets.” 

In addition, a handful of students said that automated attendance and scanning their ID to buy things at lunch are harmful to the student process. “Entering the building is going slower, even though they said it would be quicker than entering your PIN,” said eighth grade student Owen Hennes. 

Also, a seventh-grade student at EIS, Braeden McKee, suggested that the entrance lines are “very slow and inefficient.” 

Finally, ID lanyards could pose an unexpected safety issue. An article posted at jodystallings.substack.com titled “Why do schools make kids wear IDs?” argued that the need to wear lanyards poses more safety hazards than it does good. In multiple schools, lanyards have been viewed as a safety hazard because of kids using them as weapons. For instance, a third-grade student at Bearspaw School in Calgary, Canada, was choked out by his lanyard and put in critical condition.