Newton North students who are active with the school’s Theater Ink program recently protested the loss of access to their dressing rooms during the day, the Newtonite reports.
Here’s two key quotes that summarize the issue..
“The worry was that students with emotional distress would use the space to perform activities potentially dangerous to the student’s emotional health,” said junior Amanda Kuo, a student producer coordinator. “Due to its isolation from the rest of the school, no adult would be able to supervise the area to prevent these dangerous situations.”
Senior Jonathan Gomolka described the space as a “safe haven,” and said that students use it to “relax, do homework, or just cry.” He added, “The whole point of the school is to find that place. People felt hurt when they were denied that.”
I was a Theater Ink student all four years I was at Newton North, and I and many other students used the dressing rooms as a place to do exactly what Mr. Gomolka describes – homework, mostly, especially when a test was upcoming. I don’t know where the dressing rooms are located in the new building, but the old dressing rooms were twenty feet from Mr. Brown’s office, the door was always open during the day, and, although the place was cluttered, you never really got a sense of ‘isolation’.
It’s tough for me to pass judgement on this, considering I don’t know if the set-up is the same – or if things have been happening in those dressing rooms lately that necessitate this decision – but I can appreciate how these students feel robbed of what was, for my class at least, a huge asset.
Are “dangerous situations” actually happening there or almost happening? Is this the only area high school students go without adult supervision? I’m hoping the answer to both is no.