By Liz Guttenfelder

The bell system at AHS experienced many issues first semester.

The system is intended to be automatic; however, according to the attendance assistant Danna Saeugling, problems with the system required her to ring bells manually during the first months of school.

Saeugling said the school had a new system installed last April, and the salesman said it would tie into our system.  Despite this, AHS has a unique system which has necessitated bringing in people from Wisconsin, Omaha, and Lincoln to fix the problem.

The system “has a mind of it’s own,” said Saeugling. “Like yesterday I was punching in the code and it wouldn’t work.  We tried at lunch and it worked.”

Saeugling explained that the process for ringing the bells manually involves punching a multi-number code.  She uses a 4-minute timer after ringing the bell.  Though Saeugling doesn’t know when the new system will be up and running, she hopes it will be soon because the bells ring 24 times each day.

“It takes patience on a lot of people’s part because sometimes is doesn’t ring exactly when it’s supposed to,” said Saeugling.

Freshman Brody Petersen was aware there are bell problems but said it did not affect him.

Teacher Dan Huey says it was frustrating starting class late and not knowing when the bells were going to ring.

Additional work was done on the system during break, and the new system is now working automatically.