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I would like to think that this hysterical break was the product of too much coffee combined with college admission stresses. However, if I am being truthful, I had somehow managed to allow the ACT to define me as an individual, as if my score would be branded on my forehead or a big letter A stitched across my chest. I was terrified of what a bad score would mean to my identity.

Let’s Stop Letting Numbers Define Us

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Let’s Stop Letting Numbers Define Us

By Emma Lindsey

4.2, 5, 90, 30, 483, 113. We are all a number. Whether it be achieving a desired ACT score, GPA, semester average or even something as trivial as the weight on the scale or number of followers on social media, many teenagers define their self-worth on achieving an elusive number.

For many students at the high school, this time in their lives is comparable to that of a pressure cooker. A little piece within each of us dies with each new essay due or ACT date approaching. Not only must we complete these assignments, but the real pressure lies in our performance on them. To many, our best is simply not good enough.

Over my junior year, everywhere I look I see a new score to achieve or a new numeric goal to meet.  In my quest to meet these expectations of myself, I have placed all of my self-worth on attaining these goals. Any deviation from my expected scores leads to an array of self-doubt and deprecation.

This past February, for example, I, like many of my peers, decided to spend a Saturday taking the ACT. I took practice tests, packed my number two pencils and considered myself somewhat prepared. What I was not prepared for, however, was my calculator’s dying halfway through the math section and sending me on an anxiety-driven spiral of which no number of deep breaths could comfort. My reading comprehension flew out the window along with my sanity for the remainder of the test.

I would like to think that this hysterical break was the product of too much coffee combined with college admission stresses. However, if I am being truthful, I had somehow managed to allow the ACT to define me as an individual, as if my score would be branded on my forehead or a big letter A stitched across my chest. I was terrified of what a bad score would mean to my identity.

This pressure to achieve is hardly unique to me. I have seen and heard the worries of many of my peers, and our feelings coincide.

To receive a certain grade or score, many not only sacrifice their mental health but also their physical needs. I often hear high schoolers planning all nighters. I personally know a student who makes frequent trips at all hours of the night to convenience stores to fuel her energy drink addiction.

Many not only neglect sleep but food as well. After studying five hours for a history test, a junior who would like to remain anonymous to her peers for privacy reasons said,  “I don’t deserve to eat; I still have so much work to do, and I am so stressed out I cannot handle that right now.”

While students’ doing their best in school is important, mental health and physical well being should be of the foremost importance.

Although academic stresses seem to be the most common, this anxiety infecting teens can also stem from something as superficial as a weight on a scale or the number of likes on Instagram.

While most students declined to speak on this sensitive topic, over my years at the high school, I have seen harmful eating habits and body image issues in many of my peers. For many, their weight on the scale is directly proportional to their self-image.

As a teen girl myself, I am hardly immune to these shallow measurements. When I received my first iPhone, I became intoxicated by social media. I would look at my friends’ profiles and see the number of followers and likes they had and wonder why I did not have as many. I allowed some number on a social media app to control how I felt about my social standing.

All of this stress and physical strain on students’ bodies and minds is a result of the pressure to achieve some superficial score, grade point average or even body mass. Admittedly, teens’ placing such significance on a number may seem silly. However, the issue does not lie in the physical measurements but rather ourselves. The problem arises when we define our own self-worth by a simple numeric digit.

A number should not define how you see or treat yourself. The course of your life does not depend on a single score or average. Numbers are simply quantitative values and do not define you as a person or your future. After all, high school is just a fleeting moment in our lives. In a few years, everyone will be in the next chapter of their lives, and your GPA or ACT score will only be a faint memory. Now if only I could follow my own advice.

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The Blue Bin Ruse

By EMMA LINDSEY

Co-Editor-in-Chief

Plastic water bottle in hand, I stand above a blue bin in my first period French class. The plastic bin is labeled with the iconic recycling logo featuring three arrows circling each other. This specific bin is one of many scattered plentifully across the school. Yet, despite appearances, the school does not have a recycling program.

Since I first came to the high school as a sophomore, I have always tried to separate my paper, aluminum and plastic into the blue waste bins. However, my efforts have been fruitless. To my astonishment, the bins printed with the trusty three arrows are only leftovers of the failed recycling program of years past.

Stephen Hobbs, head custodian, said, “They actually cut [the recycling program] out years before I got here, but we still have the recycling bins and everything.”

Throwing away even a single bottle of water results in that trash winding up in a landfill, killing marine life, or plaguing our beaches but also increasing the amount of green gas emissions.

Today, we are in an environmental crisis. This month, the United Nations Secretary General said, “If we do not change course by 2020, we risk missing the point where we can avoid runaway climate change.”

As global warming looms over us and industry continues to ravage our environment, one might think any individual effort as futile and abandon the cause completely.

However, we should not accept our fate in becoming PIXAR’s Wall-E quite yet. While we clearly need global action, individual action is crucial as well. MBHS must play a part in the solution and reinstate a recycling program.

Change begins small. This year, there has been a global movement to eliminate one particular environmental fiend: plastic straws. The target for this global opposition may seem an odd choice considering the plastic’s petite frame. However, the rationale behind choosing such a tiny target is something to consider.

In an interview with NPR’s “Planet Money,” Heather Barnes Truelove, one of the originators of the campaign, said, “Tackling a giant problem like plastic in oceans with a small start like straws requires something called positive spillover. You refuse a straw, and suddenly you’re kind of identifying yourself as an environmentalist, like, yeah, I’m part of the solution.”

Like plastic straws, small actions such as recycling a soda can each day at school may create a similar effect. Through establishing amongst students a connection to environmental causes, a recycling program at our school could inadvertently create a mindset of activism and lifelong advocates for our planet.

MBHS principal Mr. Philip Holley was not working at here at the time of our previous program. “I know we have tried [a recycling program] in the past,” he said. “The problem was that people would put trash in the bins…It ended up taking up more time because the custodians had to go in and pick out the trash and separate it out.”

“It became more of a hassle to do that than the benefit of the recycling to begin with,” said Holley.

Although recycling does take time and effort, schools and businesses must have a program. The issue rests in students’ simply not understanding what exactly can be recycled. Mountain Brook High School should designate recycling bins to specific types of trash to avoid confusion. Mr. Holley suggested a big bottle recycler as many schools and stadiums currently use.  The school introducing bins correctly and colorfully labeled with items that can be recycled would drastically reduce the time and effort to maintain a recycling program.

While the school administration must support the cause, students need to lead the effort. Student voice is imperative to assert concerns over the absence of a recycling program at our school. Furthermore, students at the high school should take a more active role in environmental advocacy. Perhaps the high school needs an environmental club to help launch a recycling program and continue activism for environmental issues. Mrs. Sherri Traffica and Mrs. Missy Cunningham have both volunteered to help in the revival.

Unless students take action, sadly, Mountain Brook High School will continue widening its environmental footprint. As I leave the high school as a senior, I hope that the Mountain Brook community will realize the importance of the environment and put the blue bins back in their correct use.

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The school dress code prohibits common female clothing items such as tank tops, short shorts, distressed denim shorts, backless dresses, short skirts and any shirt exposing midriff and shoulders.  The rules oriented towards females run along a common theme to “cover up.” Besides gender-neutral rules such as head gear and clothing sporting obscene language, male students only face regulations against spike rings, spike bracelets and wallet chains.

The Need for a New Standard

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The Need for a New Standard

By EMMA LINDSEY

Art and Photography Editor

In 1965, students from Des Moines, Iowa, protested US military involvement in the Vietnam War by wearing black armbands. Administrators quickly instituted a dress code, forbidding arm bands by claiming they were disruptive. The case went to the Supreme Court which ruled in favor of the students in Tinker v. Des Moines Independent Community School District. High school students have challenged the dress code since the 1960s. The school dress code is hardly a new topic.

Although, students at MBHS are not exactly protesting a war, the issue seems almost as personal to some students at such a young and confusing time. Girls attach so much significance to their personal style. We often identify ourselves by the clothing we choose to wear.

However, MBHS principal Mrs. Amanda Hood, argued, “With any role that we have, there are standards that we have to meet, whether that be as a job or a student, and dress code is one of those things.”  

Mrs. Hood believes the code prepares students for future adulthood, teaching standards of work and adherence to rules. “In the workplace there will be some type of standard that you have to meet, even if that is a standard of dress. Being a student is no different.”  

While, the intent of the dress code may be well-founded, I believe in practice the school takes the code too far. Regarding dress code, the school website states, “No student shall dress in such a way as to distract from the learning process of other students.” However, the dress code acts as the distraction. The code seems to do exactly what it claims to prevent. To my knowledge, students are not distracted by exposed shoulders. Meanwhile, a student being called out by their teacher or flagged down in the hallway and sent to the office is distracting in a learning environment.

That student may miss an entire class period, and this interruption may even extend into the next class. Missing any class time, especially an entire period, can be difficult to make up. That student misses lectures and assignments. Nothing should infringe on a student’s right to learn.

One of my biggest concerns with dress code is that, in my experience, the code targets female students. The school dress code prohibits common female clothing items such as tank tops, short shorts, distressed denim shorts, backless dresses, short skirts and any shirt exposing midriff and shoulders.  The rules oriented towards females run along a common theme to “cover up.” Besides gender-neutral rules such as head gear and clothing sporting obscene language, male students only face regulations against spike rings, spike bracelets and wallet chains. Personally, I have never seen, nor expect to see, any MBHS male student wear a wallet chain.

Building a wardrobe excluding everything the school forbids can be nearly impossible while maintaining a sense of fashion that appeals to a teenage girl. The majority of clothing marketed to girls is out of dress code. As time goes on and styles change, what the school deems as appropriate should evolve as well. Walk into a store such as Urban Outfitters or SOCA, and the store is filled with violations. The availability of what the school deems “appropriate” and “non-distracting” clothing items is lacking in today’s stores. From distressed denim shorts and skirts to off-the-shoulder tops, the majority of clothing available to young girls is in violation of dress code. Before citing girls for inappropriate attire, the school administration needs to take a hard look at whether their code is up-to-date.

It is important to note that the school’s dress code is nothing new. The school has had the same standards for years. However, recently, fashion trends have emerged that violate the rules. Mrs. Hood said, “We have never seen trends like these before, prompting us to address the dress code in a way that we have never seen before.”

She added, “Standards do not change because of trends; the standard is the standard.”

However, I believe that we should revise the standard precisely because the code has remained unchanged for years. Standards should evolve as time passes. Girls are not still required to wear knee length skirts as they did in the 50s and 60s.

The sudden rise in dress code violations at the start of every school year always raises a conversation amongst the student body. If there is a gap between the administration’s standard and what the students see as appropriate, then we need to have a discussion about revising the standard.  

I do not believe students should purposefully disobey the dress code, rather that the students and the administration should revise the code to incorporate the student voice.

Mrs. Hood recognizes the code is dated. “I have considered forming a focus group of students and saying, ‘Lets throw [the code] out the window and completely rewrite it.’”

I agree that the best strategy to bridge this rift between the student and administration would be a focus group.  This proposal would add a much-needed student voice to the code.

The code, as it stands, restricts what students wear every day based on an ancient standard. Currently, students’ opinions on the topic are largely ignored and need to be heard.

One other factor about Mountain Brook High School’s culture connects to the school dress code issue. From the moment I entered the high school as a sophomore, I have heard of the freedom and trust that the school gives the students. Mountain Brook is the only school in the state to have a free period. They seem to value personal responsibility and freedom with a strong emphasis on student voice in the school.

Assistant principal Mr. Philip Holley said, “When I tell other schools that y’all have a free period they are blown away. They ask, ‘How does that even work?’”

“I think it is because of y’all. Our students are amazing. It goes back to personal responsibilities. Our students know how to handle the freedoms we give them. You are aware of where you are supposed to be and what you are supposed to be doing.”

Yet, students are policed for their clothing and are pulled out of classrooms. When it comes to female’s clothing choices, the school’s view is radically different from the independent and trusting spirit they present elsewhere.