Students are complaining and administrators are struggling to find a solution to the parking problems as the school population continues to grow. 

Last year, students were forced to park in every spot, including handicap and fire lanes in order to be able to park at school and make it on time. At the start of this year, administrators had to re-evaluate the way the parking lot operated. Currently, the school has distributed around 380 parking permits with only 380 available spots, meaning as teens pass their driver’s tests the available spots will be filled. 

“We are looking at options of redesigning the parking lot that we have, and acquiring different parking locations, but we’re really having to keep track of where our student body is,” Assistant Principal Tim McFadden said.

While some changes have been made, such as redoing the parking spots to fit a few more and designating spots for the StuCo president, student of the month, and a preferred spot purchased at the auction, students still face frustrations when it comes to parking. 

“I have first hour off, so everyone’s parking in all of the spots,” senior Clara Peyton said. “Even the freshmen, sophomores, and juniors. They’re just taking them all up.” 

Other students feel like this year’s new policy of “no such thing as junior parking” is unfair. After being forced to park as far away as possible since they started driving, the juniors feel like it is unfair to have freshmen and sophomores taking their supposed spots. Before this year, there were areas that had traditionally been parking spots for specific grades with upperclassmen having the spots closest to the school. This year, McFadden has made it clear that only seniors have preferred parking.

“There should be assigned parking for grades,” junior Willie Gauthier said. “If you’re a freshman or sophomore, park far away. We’ve been here longer, and seniority matters.”

McFadden said the administration is working to address the issues with student parking. The school’s plan will have to balance the student body and the number of parking spots available, while also being logical. 

“We have 751 students right now, and we have 380 parking spots for our students,” McFadden said. “When our senior class graduates, who’s one of our smaller classes, and we replace them with this freshman class, which is pretty big, they turn into sophomores and they start driving—if we don’t have a plan in place, that will be rough.”