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10/06/2004 Entry: "Wow, school rebellion"
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So before you read this, here's the basic storyline. Seniors at BHS traditionally are allowed to put a "senior quote" underneath their picture in the yearbook. People do all sorts of things - quoting writers, scholars, philosophers, Jay Leno, word mazes, or just the basic "HI MOM DAD I LOVE YOU ALL SO MUCH AND THANK YOU JESUS FOR ALWAYS BEING THERE FOR ME", but they've generally been around for years. Last year, two seniors - in a moment of idiocy brought about by considerable and justifiable rage - decided to put in a secret message hidden inside their quote that contained, er, profanities about their teacher. They bragged about it, everyone found out, they got blocked from graduation, and thus we thought that was the end of it. It wasn't. And now our class is paying for it, because they are taking these quotes away. Yes, it is a trivial thing to argue. Ooh, they took away my senior quotes - it's not like they decided there shouldn't be a graduation ceremony because there was heckling last year, or decided to sell all organs of BHS students on the black market, or that they're going to use as as sacrifices in their dark Administrative ceremonies. But nevertheless, it's something I want. More than that, I feel like I've wasted four years at BHS. I feel like I've been rushing around, never enjoying my life, always desperate to get into the best college I can. I don't regret that I was busy, don't regret my clubs, don't regret that everything and everyone I love generally got put on the back burner. But I do regret this experience. The following letter is to the BHS administration. I plan to get signatures - and people will sign - to accompany this letter when I turn it in Thursday. (This letter is a rough draft, btw, so excuse the errors - I'm taking it to Thomson, Grogan, and Weiser this morning for editing.) If they say no to me, I will simply embarass them as best I possibly can by sending an alternate letter to the Burbank Leader (that is, if that newspaper publishes it) talking about the injustice of our administration. I sincerely doubt that the latter letter will convince them, but it will hopefully: 1) incur the wrath of old Burbank alumni who feel sorry for our class It might not get us a senior quote anyway. But at least I tried. Link is at the moment disconnected due to inferiority
Spoken words: 23 have fallen. It's come to my attention that this may be a district-wide issue, so it might be better to address it to the board rather than just the BHS administration. Go over their heads. Also, I hear that there have been snafus with the quotes before, and they just never made it a big deal. Still, I find it asinine to punish us for the wrongs of TWO STUDENTS from a previous class, and, less to the point, that we don't get quotes or posters in the photo OR a Drama department you could call anything rather than "disappointing but decent." I don't enjoy anything at school anymore (save the all-too-brief moments with Mr. McNiff, haha). Enough of my whining. We do realize that this is a privilege, and not a right. However, these quotes are dearly cherished. Put this kind of thing nearer the top, so that the end is more forceful. Posted by Christina @ 10/06/2004 06:33 AM PST With Miss Mills on our side, and if Thomson and Grogan join in, we will have a good chance of getting our point across. They didn't just take away senior quotes. They took senior pages out of the yearbook meaning that only seniors recieve this separate package and underclassmen, even those in the pages, don't get their own copy. They also aren't letting us have posters or advertisements of our friendships in our senior picture. Not that I was going to make my poster proclaiming my love for Janice, but its the fact of the matter. Why is it that our class get soooo much taken away? Silver leaves and we get Adler, Piryoff leaves and we get AP Kindergarten.. but now THIS?! It's outrageous! Ya I'm done. If we don't fix this ridiculousness... I'll do something... Posted by Jessie @ 10/06/2004 04:08 PM PST well... these guys are the tip of the iceberg. a few years back a girl had her quote changed from whatever it was to "i don't just look stupid" and another had a quote on the car page that read, "look at what daddy bought me." (which, despite the fact that it was probably true, is still mean.) uhm. a few years back a guy tried to have "<- i'm with stupid" as his senior quote, and was denied, only to have a "the only good bread is white bred" quote published in that same yearbook. oh, and "the best bud is a jewish bud" was also denied to the yearbook. however, i still believe you deserve your quotes. honestly. that little line under each person's name defines who they are, usually implying either arrogance of stupidity. either way, it's an important aspect of our characters. yeah, i'd sign if i were in burbank. oh, and your class is not the guinney-pig class. mine is. and you're fortunate. you get mcniff instead of lang. we were the first to get the new math system (you don't even know of the integrated system, do you?) we were teh first with the HSEE.. and silver wasn't all that good of a teacher. the pass rate was only good because we had a class that was vested and interested in math/physics. i mean, like 10 of us finished calc our sophomore year. and piryoff was either a bad teacher or a bad writer or my test was scored wrong, because i got a 2 on the macro test, despite the fact that i got a B in the class (i didn't turn in ANY homework after the first 5 weeks...), i had known economics for two years from AD, i had his stupid book memorized, AND i was a damn good student in his class. wanna know what i got on micro? a three. HAHAHAHA. anways, that's the long and the short of it. oh, and i'd like to spam this: http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story2&u=/nm/20041004/od_uk_nm/oukoe_sweden_tax_men Posted by zenkalia @ 10/06/2004 08:23 PM PST oh, and they didn't brag about it. tyler didn't even want his to be printed... it was more of a joke. he submitted it as: From i mean, he WANTED to get it rejected. just to say, "i wanted to print THIS, but they wouldn't let me." it's more badass and less legal trouble... it was really obvious, janice. i mean... people aren't very smart, but with enough of them, one of 'em is bound to figure it out. each starting letter was capitolized, remember? Posted by zenkalia @ 10/06/2004 08:29 PM PST I guess it's a result of the many grudges I hold against BHS staff — mainly the office workers. Taking away senior quotes is just giving me an excuse to expose how truly troubled the administration is. I guess it's some entertainment, and it would be kinda cool organize a peaceful protest. Still, as in econ, (no, I won't write AP econ) I wonder if the benefit of this decision really outweighs the possible cost. Is this bigger than we think? What are we getting ourselves into? Food for thought. Posted by Justin Milota @ 10/06/2004 09:57 PM PST Perhaps what you really want is to be considered mature and important enough to be a part of a dialog with the administration, instead of hearing a monolog from them. Posted by aBhsTeacher @ 10/06/2004 10:18 PM PST Mike, if you put that news article here to try to convince me that all feminists are idiots - again - I really, really don't care. Yes, .ogm files are good. -- Justin: I've been talking to some teachers ("theoretically" Is this bigger than we think? A senior quote is not a big issue. Is having a peaceful protest over this worthwhile? We're truly not being oppressed, we're just really, really irritated. McNiff pointed out that some of us might be using this an excuse.. but so what? It's not like our class has done anything at _all_ in the previous four years. If it took this last event to set us off... what goes around, comes around. Well, if we don't do the protest, we don't do it. Not the end of the world. There are other ways to annoy the heck out of our administration, after all, and ones less likely to get us suspended. Btw, speaking of last year's economics teacher... Check the "about the author" thing. That cracks me up. -- to aBhsTeacher Verrrrrrry subtle. Posted by Janice @ 10/06/2004 11:45 PM PST Haha, remember Beidelman's low view of people who wrote Cliffs Notes? I bet she and Pirayoff got on swimmingly. Too bad his pass rate was less than spectacular, if my source (school gossip, naturally) hasn't led me astray. I feel bad for people who buy that guide now. I wish I'd graduated two years ago. So, so much. I can do without having fifteen bajillion new AP teachers (McNiff excepted), having privileges taken from us without provocation, and watching my reason to wake up in the morning as it crumbles into mediocrity. Yes, I know that the first and the third gripes are not really the administration's fault. It's just that I keep wondering how many more disappointments it will take before the anger gives way to resignation and/or quiet resentment. Avoid "A Dream Deferred" syndrome by restoring yearbook and making it so that not everything turns to rubbish just in time for us to walk on that stage! Posted by Christina @ 10/07/2004 12:43 AM PST you guys' lack of using the prefix AP disturbs me entirely. you're a very spiteful, fiery class. maybe judgemnental is a better word. and teacher (who i'm presuming is either mcniff or weiser because of youth or technical proficiency resulting in the use of computers (no offense to the computer illiterate grogan)), of course a dialog is the goal. students hear enough monologues as it is. yes christina... two years ago was a wonderful class. i mean, they had silver his first year and pirayoff his first(second?) year too... but at least they had drucker. and they had jen rodriguez. oh, and they still had the other calculus teacher... i can't remember his name... this is horrible, because i really liked him. damn. i don't think anyone else could have taught me BC calculus in a week and a half. hahaha. Posted by zenkalia @ 10/07/2004 11:15 AM PST Mr. Harris. Are you sure that is OUR Pirayoff? That's pretty crazy. Ya the lack of the AP prefix isn't used for Lit or Comp.. it's the "other" class.. We shouldn't have a protest... but this also isn't an excuse! It's called freedom of speech. Posted by Jessie @ 10/07/2004 04:23 PM PST uhm... it's not freedom of speech at all. it's a matter of morality. you guys deserve your quotes. encroaching on freedom of speech is what happened to yong and tyler last year. the contract stated that any student who wrote a "bad" senior quote would have their quote removed and wouldn't get a quote in the yearbook. THAT's a lack of freedom of speech right there, and punishing them when they didn't breach contract... that's lame. then again, they breached an entirely different contract about respecting teachers and other adults on campus... but the administration punished them in the context of the quote... which is incorrect. ----- Posted by zenkalia @ 10/07/2004 08:52 PM PST Complain, complain, complain, that's all you high school people do. Good lord. I can't remember the last time I asked one of you people how school was going without the words "teacher", "incompetent", and "snozberry" in the response. ESPECIALLY snozberry! Posted by Spencer @ 10/08/2004 07:46 PM PST Is that Roald Dahl? If so, bless you. But bless you anyway if it's not. Posted by Jance @ 10/09/2004 12:26 PM PST And bless you for blessing him for Roald Dahl, you crazy atheist. You'd love Dahl's short stories for grown-ups, especially "Lamb to the Slaughter." Posted by Christina @ 10/09/2004 06:17 PM PST Shoot. It's "Snozzberrys". Two zs. I'm going to go hang myself now. Can someone kick the chair out from under me? Posted by Spencer @ 10/10/2004 10:51 AM PST Yeah, blessings from an atheist are not neccessarily blessings. I figured you'd pick up on that. Nevertheless, there *were* good intentions. What am I supposed to say, though: "No blessings on you, dear child" ? I can just strangle you. Saves you cash for rope + the benefit of me getting thrown in jail and giving the BPD something to do other than ticketing twelve year olds. Posted by Janice @ 10/11/2004 07:33 AM PST Yes, I still say "bless you" when people sneeze. There's upholding separation of church and state, and then there's inanity. Posted by Christina @ 10/11/2004 07:53 PM PST You people are nucking futz. Posted by Sarah @ 10/12/2004 01:08 AM PST Gone meaning gone-too-head-over-heels-to-bring-back. I say bless you on reflex. Although hey, I hammered out the "under God", so I feel better. Posted by Janice @ 10/15/2004 03:42 AM PST Guilty as charged. Posted by Christina @ 10/15/2004 09:17 PM PST i believe that spencer has competition: http://www.livejournal.com/users/andyman03/ Posted by zenkalia @ 10/21/2004 01:38 AM PST Get a life and stop gossiping. Worry about yourselves and what you can and more importantly cant do!! Stop BLAMING teachers for your deficiencies!! Teachers dont get paid enough to deal with your SHIT. They do their jobs with the intention of making a difference! Criticize, thats all you do. How would you feel if someone posted shit and criticized you!! Be an adult and take responsibility for your own FUCKUPS!!! Posted by Yo DADDY @ 10/26/2004 09:58 PM PST
Who the fuck is that? Posted by Justin Milota @ 12/21/2004 11:56 PM PST
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and the fact that the edited version is at school.
about a protest - yes, teachers I trust - and they pretty much guaranteed it would do nothing but infuriate our administration, make them slap us into chains, etc, etc. Though I support a protest, I worry about future impact as well - letter writing is more my thing.
And yes, we would appreciate not being ignored.
