When faced with the common headache, menstrual cramps, or other aches and pains, the quick solution for most people is to take an over-the-counter painkiller, but if this happens on a school day to a U-High student, the only option to find relief is a visit to the nurse’s office, according to the Student & Family Handbook.
Policies prohibiting students from carrying and administering their own over-the-counter medication during school hours should be abolished.
Although visiting the nurse’s office allows for the nurse to make sure there isn’t a more serious underlying cause for the student’s need for medication, it sacrifices a great deal of student agency in managing their own discomfort.
Despite this policy’s presence in the student handbook, students continue to take their own medication, showing that unless these policies are to be strongly enforced, they aren’t actually preventing students from bringing and administering their medication at school.
By needing to visit the nurse’s office for a simple painkiller, students are also missing far more class, and in turn content, than if they were to take the over-the-counter medication themselves, a practice that, according to the National Library of Medicine, 57-78% of all teens already do.
If not entirely, this common and normalized defiance of the school handbook should be removed or revised on a trial basis to accommodate students’ needs, as the policy is ineffective and unnecessary.
