High school is more than just difficult. It can be arduous, strenuous, fatiguing, laborious. . . darn it! My Chromebook just died. No more synonym app today. However, my point still stands: high school isn’t easy, but with a little bit of effort and a whole lot of imagination, we can mold North Penn into the most student-friendly school in the history of our nation (or maybe just the district). Here are my suggestions:

1. A traffic light in E-pod

With apologies to Mr. Gourley: every day I intend to be on time for your class, and every day I fail for one reason: the Bermuda Triangle of E-pod. Students smash together as they meander from every pod imaginable to everywhere else, creating a disjointed mosh pit of chaos and backpack projectiles. If a traffic light was installed, every aspect of this problem would be solved – except for the inevitable road rage. Oh, well. I’m a writer, not a traffic cop. . .

2. Fundraising with a school-wide swear jar

Think about it: what if f-bombs were taxed instead of frowned upon? It would be bleeping awesome. We’d raise millions in just a few days! Forget about astroturf; our football team could literally rent out Lincoln Financial Field. Plus, think about all the extra money we’d have to throw away on, I don’t know, commemorative pop sockets. Are those still a thing? Anyway, my point is that a school-wide swear jar is a bleeping great idea.

3. Changing Knight Time to K-nap Time

North Penn is stressed, indisputably and unhealthily so. And what better way to promote mental health and academic achievement than ignoring our responsibilities and falling asleep? Trust me, because we really, really need it. I’m sure our well-meaning students would pay infinitely more attention in class if we had a bright spot (or a dark spot?) to look forward to.

4. Pretzel delivery service

Do you ever have a day when the only thing that can pluck you from your homework-induced pit of despair is a warm pretzel? Same here. So why should we have to walk all the way down to the cafeteria to buy one? Amazon uses drones, and I don’t see why North Penn has to be any different. Our engineering students are pretty smart; we can easily ask a couple of them to program a fleet for pretzel delivery. What we can’t do is continue to wait our turns like well-mannered savages.

5. Chromebook chargers in every classroom

High schoolers tend to be, um, disorganized.  Without the reminders app on my phone, for example, my productivity level would barely approach that of a sloth. Because of this, it would only be natural to help the most forgetful among us with approximately 20 extra Chromebook chargers per classroom – maybe dangling from the ceiling? That way, humans could be human without disrupting the class. As for the issue of funding, I’ll kindly refer you back to item number 2.

Yes, high school is stressful, and I obviously don’t have all the answers. But to paraphrase Leslie Knope of Parks and Recreation, “There’s nothing we can’t do if we work hard, never sleep, and shirk all other responsibilities in our lives.”

Well said, Leslie; I’m in!

(Not right now, of course. Too much homework.)