As our dedicated readers may have noticed, this year has been extraordinarily eventful for IHS (and we haven’t even exited the Death March to spring break yet!). Unfortunately, it has been the wrong kind of exciting, as the school faced challenges of all sorts.
One must wonder why it is this year, of all years, that the school’s problems with asbestos, low wages, lead, etc. have come to a head. Here are some theories as to why and proposed solutions.
- Indian Burial Ground.
Last spring, Bob Tuori directed the construction of a hoophouse that was meant to be used by Sustainable Agriculture students this spring. Little did he know that the hoophouse lies over a very small, self-contained Indian burial ground. The victims of American expansionism lie underneath the beds of tulip bulbs, spinach, and kale, cursing the organization above. Their restless spirits may have been responsible for the burst pipes that messed with the heating system and drenched various parts of the school, necessitating the removal of some normal tiles and some tiles that contained asbestos.
Solution: Unfortunately, until Kate McKinnon, Melissa McCarthy, Kristen Wiig, and Leslie Jones are released from their filming obligations, they will not be able to share the sensitive information and training they received for their parts as the new Ghostbusters. We will simply have to wait until these women can come to our rescue and save the school from ghosts.
- Contagious Hex Brought Back from Germany
According to Wikipedia, German people speak in terms of hexing. As IHS went on its biennial exchange to Tuttlingen this summer, it would not be surprising to hear that someone annoyed their host family enough to get hexed and then happened to spread the hex to other students and, eventually, the whole school.
Solution: In a tragic show of shortsightedness, the U.S. government has not yet mandated quarantines for travelers who have recently visited popular hexing destinations. However, if it can be proven that IHS’ misfortune this year stems from a contagious hex, this writer has hope that a case can be made for the necessity of such quarantines. The CDC and TSA could not possibly ignore the profound threat posed by hexes, and we can only hope that they will soon take the appropriate steps to address this potential disaster.
- First Win in Four Years by Football Team
Simply put, it was unnatural for our football team to win a game this year. And, while the universe did make a quick attempt to bring itself back into balance vis a vis the bus battering business, it simply wasn’t enough. The football team’s extraordinary luck exacted a high price from the rest of the school. Everyone else in IHS should expect another seven to ten years of moderately bad luck as the universe puts itself back in balance.
Solution: Obviously, the football team can never be allowed to win again. Even letting them play is risky; something as innocuous as a tie in a scrimmage could be the final blow for IHS.
- Years of Ignoring the Demands of Teachers, as well as Failing to Prioritize Updating the Infrastructure of a School Built in the ’60s
Many of IHS’ problems this year come from a long-standing failure to invest time and money in updating infrastructure to reflect higher health standards and raising teachers’ salaries to remain competitive with those earned in surrounding school districts. Trace amounts of lead in the water, which may have been acceptable back when the school was built in the ’60s, don’t meet the EPA’s current standards for water purity. Although asbestos was an acceptable fire retardant decades ago, today it is well-known to cause lung cancer. Given that our school is prone to flooding, it should have been a priority a long time ago (say, in 2012, when the whole school flooded) to tear out all asbestos tiles, rather than waiting for an extreme weather event in the middle of the year to force the issue. And, of course, the district should have done more to ensure benefits for its hard-working teachers, rather than counting competitive pressure from young SUNY Cortland and Ithaca College graduates to keep its teachers grateful for their jobs. It’s a disgrace that in a school where so many students attain wild success, as we are reminded at quarterly award ceremonies, the teachers who make such success possible are so poorly compensated.
Solution: Given that a structural reevaluation of ICSD’s short-sighted policies is about as likely as the cast of Ghostbusters coming to IHS and purifying the whole school, we might as well start lobbying Kate McKinnon now.