- My biggest pet peeve in the school has got to be the fact that there are no paper towels to be found anywhere. You go to the bathroom, wash your hands, then stick your hands under some dinky hand dryer until you finally give up and resort to wiping your hands on the back of your pants. Not only is it frustrating, but it is unsanitary to walk around with wet hands. I get the whole effort to “go green,” but does that mean we really cannot have paper towels? In my mind, they are a necessity. Also, when someone spills their Starbucks drink in class, everyone looks around the room in utter confusion because there are no paper towels to clean up the mess. Eventually, they use toilet paper to clean it up but once again, the lack of paper towels causes frustration. Sure, you might think using toilet paper is a simple, sensible alternative. However, using toilet paper for messes takes away toilet paper from those who really need it, and that’s a whole other issue. This problem also relates to tissues. It’s flu season, everyone’s congested, yet students have to go steal some toilet paper from the bathroom so that they can go blow their nose. Some teachers have caught on and have gotten their students to bring in boxes of tissues at the beginning of the year, but the classrooms of those who haven’t have turned into gross symphonies of sniffling. Paper towels are versatile and useful and the school would be less of a mess if only there were paper towels to help clean it up.
- I was pretty shocked when I arrived in some of my classes this year to discover that there were assigned seats. Oh, I’m sorry, I didn’t realize we were still in third grade. I am 18 years old for crying out loud; I can choose a president but I can’t be trusted to choose where I want to sit? I was looking around the room at everyone in their assigned seats and people were miserable. What is the point of having a friend in your class if they’re stuck behind you two rows back and three columns over? I get that teachers want to discourage extraneous chatter, but it can be a little insulting that they don’t trust students enough to let them choose where they sit. There are no assigned seats for Back to School Night, so why treat the students any different? After all, some seniors are already legal adults. It’s high school. It’s time to get rid of assigned seats.
- One recent phenomenon that has been resurrected is hacky sack. It’s a fun game and an effective icebreaker, yet it has been deemed inappropriate by administrators and it is not allowed in the hallways anymore. It’s like the administrators saw students having too much fun so they had to put a stop to it. God forbid there be any kind of enjoyment between classes. It is a harmless game and I have even seen teachers join the circle and show off their hacky sack skills. Needless to say, I was shocked when I witnessed a hacky sack session get broken up the other day for no apparent reason. Let the kids have some fun. Life is too short to be putting bans on hacky sack.
- The stairways in the school have been the source of many awkward moments. They are only really wide enough for about 1.5 people, which would be convenient if you could split your friend in half. This faulty design leads to staggering, which causes crowding, and leaves everyone wondering why going up the stairs is such a burden. There are times where someone is having a particularly bad Monday, so they decide to walk extra slowly down the steps. Luckily for you, you are then forced to walk at a snail’s pace since passing them would mean bumping into them and causing a terribly awkward situation. I hope you were not in a hurry. There are also massive backups at the top and bottom of the main staircase. Kids are only able to go down one at a time, people going to the next staircase run into those looking to get to the cafeteria, and no one seems to be able to say goodbye to their friend without clogging up the whole hallway. Much like how a commuter would feel after 45 minutes of sitting in rush hour traffic, having to wait in line for the stairs at the end of the day makes you want to pull your hair out. What is even more frustrating is that the space is there to make a wider staircase, but by now it’s too late. Construction is over and stairway traffic is just beginning.
- The first quarter ended a few weeks ago, so I could not help but finish up with a rant about it. Students go mad at the end of each quarter trying to get all of their grades in and make up any requisite work. They struggle to get everything in on time because every student is afraid of the infamous cutoff where no incoming work is accepted. However, the reciprocal of this situation is not always equal as teachers do not seem to feel the same pressure that students do to get everything in on time. Teachers leave students on the edge of their seats as they take their time finishing up all their grades. Then, after the cutoff for incoming work, teachers finalize their grades, sometimes surprising students with a 10 point or more decrease in their overall grade. Now, how was anyone supposed to predict that their grade was going to fall that far? What exactly were they supposed to do about it? What are they going to do at the end of the year when the average of their letter grades is significantly skewed by this unfortunate surprise? Or more importantly, what if colleges are going to see their grades and they see a grade that the student had no idea would be there? Students have to prepare for the worst as they go into finals week because there is no telling how far their grade will drop. Your grade could crash overnight and there would be nothing you could do about it. By the time you find out, it would be too late, the quarter would be over and you would just have to move on to the next quarter hoping the same thing does not happen again.
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