Have you noticed the food smashed in the hallways? If yes, you would be one of many of students who see it too. The school has been taking many measures to fix this issue including adding a no eating in the hallway policy, adding an extra room to eat in, and changing the set-up of the cafeteria.

In previous years, students used to eat in the hallways, but on the first day of school when Assistant Principal Jeff Schneider went over class rules in the PAC, students were told there was to be no eating in the hallways. As the school year progressed, there were still people eating in the hallways that had no punishment. As the weather started growing worse, more people started eating in the hallways because the cafe and overflow room were full, and it was too cold to eat outside.

The administration started to enforce the policy of not eating in the hallways a few weeks before Christmas break started. This angered students because they felt as if there was no where to eat, and for a short time, there wasn’t. When students returned from break, they were faced with a newly set up cafeteria and strict hallway rules. Now, instead of three lines for lunch there are only two, with extra tables filling up the empty space.

Many students might be confused as to why they suddenly are not allowed to eat in the hallways when they have been doing it previously. One of the cited reasons for the hallway policy is that students are disrupting the classes along the hallway. When students are trying to learn, and there is a group of noisy kids outside their classroom, it can be very distracting.

Principal Matthew Bertasso says, “Classes are still in session, therefore it becomes a disrupting issue.”

Another reason is that there was smashed food and large amounts of trays being left along the hallways, which created extra and unnecessary clean up for the janitors. The problem is that students don’t pick up after themselves when they drop something.

Senior Kat Finseth feels this is something that won’t change until the responsibility gets placed on the students.

“I think the irresponsible high schoolers are just going be just high schoolers so they are just going to be stupid until they have to experience cleaning up themselves. ”

Bertasso explained how the school has taken action to fix the issues by identifying students who have made a noticeable mess in the

hallway.

“We looked on cameras to see who’s leaving trays in the hallway and pulled people in to talk to them about it.”

In the wake of this newly enforced rule, students had many opinions on it. Some feel it is important that this is enforced, some hate it and want to sit in the hallways, and some it doesn’t affect.

For most students, where they eat has not been affected by the change as they already ate in the cafe or the overflow room. But some students have opinions as to how the school could help with the cleanup.

Freshman Avery Cavacini gave her input on the situation, “They could have put more tray stations and garbage cans in the hallways. It’s not fair that they took the privilege away from all of us when only some are making the mess.”

Some students have a positive outlook on the situation, and think it can be helpful for the future.

Finseth added, “I understand why they made that rule because I know it was a really big hassle cleaning up after everyone, but as the school grows, they need to find more space.”

As an administrator, Bertasso doesn’t quite understand why students feel so strongly about eating in the hallways.

“If there is a reason why students want to eat in the hallway, then please invite students to talk to me about the special benefit of eating the hallways.”

There are some things students can do that would be helpful to school administration. Students should clean up after themselves, eat in respective places, take trays to the assigned stations and not on trash cans. Students should also be respectful of classes going on during lunch, and make sure that teachers dismiss for lunch at the appropriate time.

Overall, while there are mixed emotions about the new policy, the faculty believes that this will benefit both the school and the students.