Hallway Jams
By Kelly Barros ('23)
Are you sick of being late to your classes due to overcrowded hallways? Tired of being trapped in gridlock by people who are also just trying to get to class? The crowded hallways in our school have gotten increasingly worse over the years, disregarding COVID-19, when many people weren’t in school. This is a serious problem. What are some possible solutions to our grand dilemma?
Vanessa Spataro (‘23), agrees with me that the crowded hallways are a big problem that needs to be addressed. Spataro said she hates dealing with crowded hallways because it makes it tricky to walk due to a "limited amount of space.” Vanessa plans her routes strategically to get to her classes in the fastest way possible. “That is really the only way to get through,” Spataro said.
Lauren Vallabhaneni (‘24) says she must walk quickly through the crowd because students only have four minutes to get to where they need to go. Lauren adds, “sometimes the hallways are really crowded!" To compensate she has to devise time management skills in the hallways.
The hallway traffic often varies depending on the location in the building and the time of day. 12th Grade Assistant Principal, Mr. Kolesar said, "The biggest challenge is the back hallway by the 300's classrooms.” He says it has “historically been a challenge” because most of the number of classes held there.
Photo courtesy of The Pitch
Although many students are bothered by the traffic in the hallways, Abey Alex (‘23) is “not affected all that much” and it “doesn’t bother” him.
Maybe we should all be like Nate MacAlpin (‘23) who thinks crowded hallways are “necessary to have a true high school experience.”
Or maybe we should consider what Mr. Fyffe, Assistant Principal, says about the traffic in all of the hallways: “With a school the size of NRHS, it is, in some respects, the nature of the beast.” However, there are still some possible solutions to consider.
Solution #1: One-Way Hallways
One possible solution to all the hallway traffic is having one-way hallways. During COVID times, NRHS made one-way hallways that only allowed students to only walk in one direction. Students had to follow the direction of the hallway they were in and if they needed to go the opposite direction, they just had to use a different route.
What do students and administrators think about this? Mr. Kolesar thinks that a one-way hallway in our school is difficult to do. He says that there are many “different schedules” and for students to manage getting class in a timely manner, it just would not work for the best.
Sophia Banzil (‘23) also thinks that one-way hallways would be unnecessarily hard to do. She says “they would be convenient,” but people would not “cooperate” and it would take a “while” for it to work.
Not only does Brian Dong (‘23) not like this idea, he thinks “it causes students to take extra long ways” and they would probably just ignore the rules so they wouldn’t be late to class.
Nate MacAlpin shares that he hated one-way hallways even when we had them. Many people, such as Nate, truly dislike the idea of one-way halls and hope it doesn’t come back.
Photo courtesy of Spoke.news
I personally think one-way hallways are a hit or miss. You can never make everyone happy with a decision, and it can either work out really well or fail miserably. If everyone cooperated and did their best to follow the rules of the hallways, it could work. But if people don’t listen, that’s a different story.
Photo courtesy of Echo Newspaper
Solution #2: More Time in Between Classes
Having more time in between class periods can help alleviate the traffic in the hallways. Instead of just four minutes, there could be five or more minutes to get from class to class.
Xiadani DeLaRosa (‘24) believes that having more time in between classes is a good idea. Xiadani has two classes on opposite sides of the building and she says the traffic in the hallway “makes it difficult to get to class before the bell rings.” She thinks it would be very helpful to have more time to get from one place to another.
Mr. Kolesar notes that adding more time to the school day “is not as easy as saying let’s add six to eight minutes.” He said that a couple years ago there were “five minutes in between periods” and there was an increase in required instructional time needed in classrooms.
According to Mr. Kolesar, adding more time to the school day would even involve buses and since they would have to be at the school earlier and do pick ups later. Overall, these changes would also affect bus routes for Fieldstone and the elementary schools. I never knew there was so much to think about when wanting to add a couple more minutes to a school day.
I believe that having more time to switch classes would be beneficial for those who have classes on opposite sides of the building. The problem with having more time is that those who have classes in the same areas as their previous class, would have too much extra time, and instead spend it crowding the halls with their friends.
Other Suggestions:
Many people I interviewed had very interesting ideas about how to improve the traffic jams in the halls.
Lauren Vallabhaneni thinks the solution to this problem could be if people got “priority” for certain classes. If everyone moves at a good pace, the “crowd would not be as bad.”
Nate MacAlpin’s suggestion is that people should “stop crowding” in “groups” in the hallways. And Vanessa Spataro emphasizes that students have to stop “looking down” at their phones. It’s because it causes people to walk “slower,” when they should be focusing on getting to their classes.
Mr. Fyffe says one thing he and his administrative team take pride in is their “ability to work together” when coming up with “proposing, and implementing new policies and procedures.” He says it’s very hard for him to individually identify around 1-2 concrete solutions to the traffic in the hallways. Mr. Fyffe acknowledges traffic jams can be “mitigated” if students walk directly to their classes, and avoid stopping in the halls.
Cover courtesy of Kevin Cahill
Banner courtesy of The Northwest Arkansas Democrat Gazette