By Associated Press - Friday, March 7, 2014

LINCOLN, Neb. (AP) - Lincoln officials are thinking about requiring some middle school students to wear photo IDs on lanyards around their necks.

The ID system has been required at district high schools since 2007, the Lincoln Journal Star said (https://bit.ly/1f5XLnx ). The IDs help administrators ensure the teenagers they see in the school buildings are supposed to be there. The IDs also serve as lunch tickets and passes at football games and other school events.

District security director Joe Wright said he wants to test the system at Irving Middle School and another middle school he hasn’t yet selected.

The idea appeals to Irving’s principal, Susette Taylor, who said it will help students get ready for high school and help teachers become familiar with students faster.

Taylor, who worked at Lincoln Southwest High School before taking over at Irving, said administrators found other uses for the IDs. Among them: The IDs were scanned when students went into the school library, nurse’s office or to an assembly. That helped teachers and administrators ensure students who’d left their classrooms actually showed up where they were supposed to be going.

“When we started scanning (IDs) in, it’s amazing how many people went to assemblies,” Taylor said.

The company that makes the IDs will provide them free for two middle schools for a year, Wright said, which will give the district a chance to determine whether they’re worth the expense for the middle schools.

He also said he hopes the middle school students would gain some sense of responsibility as they keep track of their IDs.

“It’s an experiment, for sure,” Wright said.

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Information from: Lincoln Journal Star, https://www.journalstar.com

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