Beautiful Terra Nova...


Articles Dante Alighieri Arthur Dent Jesus Jones Thomas Paine Other Authors Contact Us! Letter to the Editor Dante Alighieri Arthur Dent Jesus Jones Thomas Paine	Beautiful Terra Nova... Arthur Dent When I set out to write this article, I thought I'd be writing about some of the dirty and disgusting classrooms I'd seen around campus. Legendary amongst students and custodial staff, these classrooms aren't just dirty - they're garbage heaps of rotting food and trash stuffed on shelves or wedged between books. However, when I set out to investigate the situation, digital camera in tow, what I found wasn't so much that these classrooms were gross (they weren't pretty, but they weren't entirely health code violations, either). No, what I found instead is that our entire campus is pretty much one giant eyesore. This isn't just the fault of students too damn lazy to take garbage to the trash can, although that's an issue, too. More important in the overall aesthetic quality of TN (or lack thereof) is the sheer amount of JUNK around the place. There is one classroom on the third floor that is notorious for being a trash heap and smelling particularly bad. It has, at times, been so noxious that two separate teachers who do not teach full-time in this classroom took it upon themselves to clean the place because they just couldn't stand to be in the room as it was. Who is at fault for the room being so thrashed? A) The teacher who allows the situation to persist? B) The Administration who doesn't tell the teacher to either clean it up or police his students' eating habits? Or how about C) the students themselves who stuff the garbage in between the National Geographic magazines? I'd say it's D) all of the above. [Side note: The only people not at fault are the custodians. They are not there to pick up the garbage that should have wound up in the can…they're already running from room to room like maniacs trying to empty every can, sweep every floor, clean the bathrooms, and mop the hallways.] Tell me: what sort of person shoves a half-eaten brownie amidst periodicals? Is the garbage can so far away? . People, we're slobs. And it's not only the main building; just look at the rest of the campus. After scoping out a few otherwell-known dumpy rooms on the second floor (none were too terrible, although I hear I caught them on a good day) and experiencing the ridiculously poor air quality of Room 210, I headed toward the portables. What struck me when I got to the area behind the woodshop were the piles of broken-down junk. I couldn't even identify some of it. There was what looked like a refrigerator lying on its back, door removed, filled with miscellaneous garbage. In another area, there were broken-down desks and bags of trash. These heaps of unattractive rubbish are not there as a result of students, which led me to a revelation: no wonder people throw their garbage all over the place…it seems that everyone else is! Of course, it doesn't matter what "everyone else does." (Our mothers have been trying to pound that into our heads forever.) Coke cans semi-buried in attractive foliage is inexcusable. Someone put it there. Why? When I looked at the area under the netting where the elevator is being installed, I saw a ton of flotsam and jetsam strewn about. No matter how it got there - it makes the whole place look disgusting. And we simply ignore it and pile on more of the same. I don't know about you, but I kind of like it when my surroundings look nice. If I have to be at school, I want to be proud of it, not just because of the quality of its education and people, but also for its LOOKS. I take pride in my personal appearance; I want to take pride in the appearance of my school, too. It's time to clean up our collective act - ALL of us. Email: ArthurDentTN@yahoo.com	Archive Back Issues Why? Cartoons Poetry Random Rants Disclaimers Losers and Kudos of the Week Letters to the Editor Editor's Notes Picture of the Week
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Arthur Dent

When I set out to write this article, I thought I'd be writing about some of the dirty and disgusting classrooms I'd seen around campus. Legendary amongst students and custodial staff, these classrooms aren't just dirty - they're garbage heaps of rotting food and trash stuffed on shelves or wedged between books. However, when I set out to investigate the situation, digital camera in tow, what I found wasn't so much that these classrooms were gross (they weren't pretty, but they weren't entirely health code violations, either). No, what I found instead is that our entire campus is pretty much one giant eyesore. This isn't just the fault of students too damn lazy to take garbage to the trash can, although that's an issue, too. More important in the overall aesthetic quality of TN (or lack thereof) is the sheer amount of JUNK around the place.

Miscellaneous garbage piled behind the woodshop There is one classroom on the third floor that is notorious for being a trash heap and smelling particularly bad. It has, at times, been so noxious that two separate teachers who do not teach full-time in this classroom took it upon themselves to clean the place because they just couldn't stand to be in the room as it was. Who is at fault for the room being so thrashed? A) The teacher who allows the situation to persist? B) The Administration who doesn't tell the teacher to either clean it up or police his students' eating habits? Or how about C) the students themselves who stuff the garbage in between the National Geographic magazines? I'd say it's D) all of the above. [Side note: The only people not at fault are the custodians. They are not there to pick up the garbage that should have wound up in the can…they're already running from room to room like maniacs trying to empty every can, sweep every floor, clean the bathrooms, and mop the hallways.] Tell me: what sort of person shoves a half-eaten brownie amidst periodicals? Is the garbage can so far away? . People, we're slobs. And it's not only the main building; just look at the rest of the campus.

Recycling? After scoping out a few otherwell-known dumpy rooms on the second floor (none were too terrible, although I hear I caught them on a good day) and experiencing the ridiculously poor air quality of Room 210, I headed toward the portables. What struck me when I got to the area behind the woodshop were the piles of broken-down junk. I couldn't even identify some of it. There was what looked like a refrigerator lying on its back, door removed, filled with miscellaneous garbage. In another area, there were broken-down desks and bags of trash. These heaps of unattractive rubbish are not there as a result of students, which led me to a revelation: no wonder people throw their garbage all over the place…it seems that everyone else is!

Of course, it doesn't matter what "everyone else does." (Our mothers have been trying to pound that into our heads forever.) Coke cans semi-buried in attractive foliage is inexcusable. Someone put it there. Why? When I looked at the area under the netting where the elevator is being installed, I saw a ton of flotsam and jetsam strewn about. No matter how it got there - it makes the whole place look disgusting. And we simply ignore it and pile on more of the same.

I don't know about you, but I kind of like it when my surroundings look nice. If I have to be at school, I want to be proud of it, not just because of the quality of its education and people, but also for its LOOKS. I take pride in my personal appearance; I want to take pride in the appearance of my school, too. It's time to clean up our collective act - ALL of us.

Email: ArthurDentTN@yahoo.com