Fifty-two percent of scheduled senior classes were missed yesterday as a result of absences for college visits, the March of the Living Holocaust awareness trip, the Coachella Music Valley Festival and the unofficial senior “ditch day.”

This is the second highest number of absences in the school’s history after April 21, 2005 when only 33 percent of senior classes were attended, Upper School Attendance Coordinator Gabriel Preciado said.

Preciado said that most of the excuses for the absences were from “ditch day.”

“Coachella and ditch day were pretty much the same thing, they were both ditching,” Preciado said. “Coachella was not an excused or valid reason to miss school.”

Students who were absent will be given a detention.

“That will suit them well for what they want to do, basically achieve a day in which they do something contrary to the rules,” Preciado said.

The school has not done anything to stop these absences.

“The only thing we do is let them know that they will have a detention,” Preciado said. “Seniors do this, they do this every year.”

Only students who had pre-arranged absences, including college visits and school trips, were excused.