Tradition Never Graduates

-Grayson Berryhill

It begins with a whispered conversation, or maybe a stream of text messages.  After some quick refinements to the execution strategy, a timeline, selective invitations to participate, and, if necessary, an escape provision, the latest senior prank is ready for launch.  As a senior, it is an implied duty to uphold school traditions and bring honor and glory to your class. This glory is partly achieved through the time-honored tradition of senior pranks. Although the ideas and execution of senior pranks have changed over the years, the goal remains constant:  to leave a humorous and lasting impression so that every future class to go through the school will remember your class and the legacy you left. After all, tradition never graduates. Yet this year, things are different. The seniors have been warned that pranks have consequences.                         

The Class of 2008 kicked off the year with a Silly String fight in the commons, which included a large majority of the senior class and the entire stock of Silly String from Randalls, Albertsons and Walgreens. 

“It worked out perfectly,” senior Mark Heard said regarding the fight. “When the whistle sounded, everyone pulled out cans of Silly String and started spraying it everywhere.”

Although seniors agree it was a “great success,” the prank was viewed much differently by the faculty and staff.

“The Silly String crossed the line,” principal Linda Rawlings said, regarding the prank as vandalism. “Anything in the school day is disruptive and any type of damage caused is not right.”

Students were put on notice at the September __ assembly warning that there will be consequences if pranks refuse to cease.

But in comparison to previous pranks performed at the school, the Silly String fight may be one of the less harmless, and legal, of them all.  Past senior pranks at Westlake have ranged from stealing road barriers and street signs and setting them up in the commons, to releasing three greased pigs on campus tagged 1, 2 and 4,  and just about everything in between. 

“I remember a bunch of us leaving campus one day to steal the Ronald McDonald that stands on the McDonald’s signs,” Janet Petri, a 1985 alumni said. “We took it to classes with us and just let it stand in the back of the room. A cop eventually came in and took it, but he danced out of the room with it, understanding it was all good fun. There was no punishment at all.”

Granted, Westlake Hills was a much smaller community in 1985, but consequences for out-of-line pranks have been enforced through the years when deemed necessary.  The standard for what is unacceptable has broadened in recent years, making it nearly impossible to pull off a senior prank without someone getting in trouble.

“We will punish anyone we catch,” Rawlings said. “It is a student’s right to go to school, but it is a privilege to have off campus lunch, final exemptions and college visitation days.  All of these [privileges] are presently on the table.”

The students must now take this warning under consideration and decide whether the action is worth the consequence.

“If it comes down to it, taking away off-campus lunch would not be the end of the world,” senior Susan Vanden Dries said.  “Senior pranks leave a legacy and going off campus doesn’t.”

Many others agree that some allowances must be made to let the seniors express themselves.

“Our pranks are not intended to hurt anyone,” senior Brittany Johnson said. “We are just having fun and want to make our last year a memorable one.”

But now that the word is out that any individual or group who commits a senior prank may suffer a consequence, the choice lies in the hands of the Class of 2008.

“In life, every action has a consequence, and this is no exception,” Rawlings said. “Enough is enough.”