As we all know, Staples High School seniors try to pull off at least one big prank per year. The most common tradition they partake in is senior skip day, in which  the seniors either show up to school and wander the halls or skip altogether. 

A skip day is supposed to be a day where the students catch the teachers off guard by not showing up to their classes, but that’s not what the seniors do.  Instead, these “skip days” are planned, with the teachers and administration both informed. Talk about lame.  

Seniors, letting your teachers know when you are taking a day off is not only defeating the purpose of “skip day,” but also ruining the fun. 

If that isn’t bad enough, seniors also have their mommies and daddies cover for them. The vast majority of the seniors who participate in Senior Skip Day have their parents call the school in the morning of the skip day to prevent them from receiving an unexcused absence. This completely disregards the point of a skip day.  Own the prank and accept the consequences. As the saying goes, you can’t have your cake and eat it, too.   

Every day at Staples, many students skip classes when they don’t feel like going. If they don’t want to change for gym, they skip so they don’t get a negative participation grade. If they forgot to study for a test, they might skip class to avoid failing. These are examples of unplanned skips, where the teachers aren’t aware ahead of time of the student’s absence. 

That’s a real skip day, because it is one where the teachers are surprised at the noticeable absence of several hundred students from classes.

To do something out of the ordinary once in a while, especially when it’s your last year in high school, is a tradition the Staples seniors have kept alive for years. Senior skip day is a chance for the senior class to coordinate together to have one last hurrah during their time at Staples:it’s a day to break the rules. But a skip day isn’t a skip day without catching the rule-makers by surprise.