Students eligible for the attendance incentive will be allowed to skip final exams. Administrators will release the list of eligible students tomorrow, Dec. 9. Students can still lose their exemptions if they allow grades to drop or absences to increase before finals begin.

Students with perfect attendance and grades above 70 will be exempt from finals. In addition, students with three or fewer excused absences and grades above 80 are also exempt from the final exams next week. Eligibility is calculated per class, and because some absences do not count toward the incentive, exemptions are considered on a case-by-case basis.

“Students get the impression that the incentive is only there for kids with high grades,” assistant principal Mark McCulloch said. “But with an 80, that hits middle ground, and the perfect attendance with a 70 picks up a lot of people. It is nice you can reach out and get those who are doing the work and are here, so they should be rewarded as well.”

Since the introduction of the incentive, attendance rates have risen to 97 percent.

“It is a real fair program, and it has helped our attendance rates, truancy,  teacher workloads, everything,” McCulloch said. “Any school would be really happy to be at 97 percent. When you think in terms of money, that is a big deal. I’m glad we are doing it.”