Every year, anticipation builds at the end of the year as seniors reach the final weeks of their time at New Trier. Dr. Dohrer makes announcements over the PA system in the morning, teachers sternly address their students, and eager sophomores and juniors buzz in the hallways, all with their eyes on senior pranks.
Now, I’m certainly not one to say, “All pranks are harmful and pointless,” because that’s simply not true. The only things at New Trier that actually are completely pointless are the iPads everyone is going to receive. But there are certain pranks that fall under that moniker of “harmful and pointless.”
The main example, each and every year, is when some dolt throws something down the P-stairwell. Whether the substance cascading down the stairs is a bucket of crickets, flour, or an avalanche of something that rhymes with “Bilbo,” it’s the same old story and—just like our football team—it’s nothing to brag about.
In the end, where does this “prank”—and I use that word in its most generous sense—lead? Only to hours of cleanup from the school’s custodial staff which, quite frankly, has enough on their plate, and a collective yawn from the student body.
Hey Class of 2013: please don’t do this. It doesn’t matter whether you’re chucking hard-boiled eggs, live octopi, or whatever inedible mystery meat ARAMARK is attempting to pass off as beef these days. You’re not impressing anyone and the cleanup is laborious and simply not worth the tomfoolery that won’t crack a smile on your one friend who still thinks “Family Guy” is funny.
Unoriginal shenanigans can put lives in danger as well. In 1992, a group of seniors thought it would be a good idea to release a pig doused in motor oil into the school from the cafeteria. According to the Chicago Tribune, in the ensuing chase the poor pig suffered a wide variety of lacerations and bruises and was so dehydrated that the Animal Control officer who arrived at the scene initially thought it was dead. While I am far from a PETA enthusiast, I see a clear issue with this.
As a member of the Class of 2013, I say we step up our act this year. A prank, if original and in good taste, can be a fun experience for all parties involved, even for the one being pranked. However, I’m also not fully endorsing pranks by any means. My point is this: if you’re going to pull a senior prank, do something creative and new.
Many in the past have found ways to do this. For example, a few years ago students created a story that is now firmly embedded in New Trier lore with a simple click of a camera and payment to a newspaper. The jokesters sent a picture of the front of the Winnetka Campus to the Real Estate section of a newspaper and listed “the property on 385 Winnetka Avenue” for sale with the superintendent’s phone number as the contact. The only casualties were the shattered hopes of a few unfortunate potential buyers.
In the interest of full disclosure, I certainly will not do a senior prank and the most mischievous thing I’ve ever done in my life was taking my dad’s car out in the middle of the night for a run to the 24-hour IHOP in Evanston. (This ended all too quickly with an illegal left turn and red and blue lights behind me. Oops.) So if I think of a senior prank, anyone can.
Why not throw a retirement party for an unsuspecting and absolutely not retiring Dr. Yonke in the last week of school this year? Finding an administrator with a sense of humor would likely not prove to be too difficult. As an added bonus, in terms of overall effort, this would be easier than seeing through girls who condemn “The Top 50” list merely because they were snubbed from inclusion onto it.
Another smaller prank that those of us here at the News could pull would to be to put together a paper full of half-written articles and desperate space fillers instead of at least trying to achieve some quality writing—oh wait, the Near True News already pulled that one.
The future is bright for the Class of 2013, but for the next few weeks, we enjoy our final days in the halls of New Trier. This year, rule the school as the graduating class. This year, we prank creatively and harmlessly or not at all. And finally, this year, if someone drops something down the P-stairwell, we drop them down to the Class of 2014.