What’s up with the lockers? 

By Lina Coppola

Westhill is lined with lockers that haven’t been touched in years.  Many students want to use the lockers yet they are unavailable. But the question that often arises is do students want to use the lockers? Many believe that being able to have a locker will be beneficial as the extra storage could help in many ways, while others believe it’s a safety concern and will lead to pest problems.  

But many also face problems with the weight of their bag. Rylee Walters (28’) is one of the victims of this, and claims her backpack weighs approximately 20 pounds. And doing this every day could possibly lead to back problems.  “My back always hurts from [her backpack] and it would make it a lot easier to be able to put books away in your locker,” Walters said. Therefore being able to put some notebooks in lockers could decrease the weight of backpacks giving students a break. 

When talking to Caryn Corridon she provided an insight on why lockers aren’t in use relative to our generation. Ms. Corridon moved here after teaching in Florida for numerous years. And throughout her teaching career, there has been an increase in sneaky students. “I come from a school where we had lockers and kids could hide stuff in them such as guns and lead to school shootings,” Ms. Corridon said. Additionally, students could hide drugs and vapes in their lockers which also can lead to issues in the school. 

Student-athletes claim it would be more beneficial for them to store their equipment and uniforms without having to go to the locker room. “They don’t open [the locker rooms] until 7:20 and we have to get to class at 7:25 which leaves us barely enough time to get into the locker room and get to your classes,” Sophia Calorossi (28’) said. She claims that items are being stolen from students when they leave their stuff there. These events led to many of Westhill Athletics participants carrying their stuff around all day. Therefore being able to put sports bags in lockers could be time efficient for students and safer.

Some also believe that possessing lockers will lead to being less forgetful and cleaner transitions will occur. “It could help us with transitioning [during the passing period]  and not keeping our stuff at home,” Sophie Barwinski (28’) said. This means that students might not have to carry everything throughout the day, reducing clutter. And students could quickly grab what they need between classes without having to carry it around all day. Most of us know how it feels to have to carry around a class project all day just to use it during one class period. 

Mrs. Wendy Bosco, a science teacher at WHS agreed upon the fact that lockers should be assigned to students because students “have a lot to carry in their bag.” But she understands why they aren’t used as students carrying food could lead to an increase in the pest problem that already coexists in many Westhill classrooms.

We tried to reach out to the administration but received no response on the matter.