Along the side of the soccer field, running from the basketball courts to the tennis courts and then to the rear parking on Jardin Avenue, is a walkway. This walkway is a thoroughfare for students and for locals who use the facilities alike. Although sometimes overlooked due to its out-of-the-way location at the northern end of the school, the walkway is a vital part of the school’s infrastructure.

Students who wished to use the walkway to get home on March 15, at 2:30 p.m., found it fenced off.

An eight-foot-high chicken wire fence runs around the perimeter of the soccer field, including the softball diamond. The other end of the walkway, between the baseball field and the tennis courts, has been blocked off as well. The blockage is due to construction work in the field. Assistant Principal Ralph Cave said that the official release date for the field was August 15; he also claimed that the walkway would be open by the end of March.

It is now late April, and the fence continues to impede students from entering or exiting the campus.

The only solution the school has provided is for people to use the side road, next to the softball field, as an alternative route. This solution has failed. Congestion on the west road has become a major issue, particularly for the cars that share the road with pedestrians entering or exiting the campus. Whereas this road was once nearly deserted, it is now a common sight to see it inundated with students during the mornings and the afternoons. Worse, the detour through the side road is considerably longer than the north walkway—in order to get from one end of the walkway to the other, students must walk thrice as far as they did before the fence was installed. This lengthy detour forces students who are closer to the north side of school to either leave earlier or be tardy. Some have chosen the latter.

Students have had to deal with inconveniences due to construction in the past. For instance, when the parking lot was being renovated, a large area of the campus was fenced off. However, the school made special efforts to make the construction period as convenient for students as possible. A minimum area was cordoned off, allowing students to move between the front of the school and their classrooms in relatively little time. No such luxuries have been afforded in dealing with the field. No work is being done on the walkway itself, nor do the construction workers need to cross the walkway to do their jobs. Fencing around the walkway would not have required much more fence, yet the administration chose to forgo such a timesaving measure.

The blocking of the walkway is the latest in a series of events that reflects the administration’s negligent attitude toward the north side of the school. The area was fenced off at the beginning of school for work on the field. Several months later, at the beginning of the Holiday Recess, a fallen fence lay across the walkway. When students returned two weeks later, it was still there. It was not removed until the next day. Additionally, at times the walkway is obstructed by soccer goals left propped up against the baseball field fence. There is no doubt that similarly obstructing the front entrance would not be tolerated.

Alienating sections of population and obstructing free movement are two of the surest ways for a community to destroy itself. Yet the school continues to block out anyone for whom the north side is more convenient. It continues to act without considering the interests of the hundreds of students who cannot simply use the parking lot. Although these north-siders may be a minority, the administration cannot make them into second-class citizens.