Yeah, I know what you're going to say. "Timmy with ANOTHER Sullivan update? Geez..,". But I have a valid reason for blogging about Sullivan on this snowy afternoon. Did school go well? Yes. Did everybody focus on their final exams? For the most part. But asking those two questions are not the purpose of this post.
The purpose of this post is to talk about today's food fight which occurred at right about noon. I can tell everyone this, from personally being there, it seemed very much like a riot to me. One minute, things were calm. People were yakking at the top of their lungs, eating, you know, normal lunchroom behavior. But them BAM. An orange is thrown and all hell breaks loose. I didn't even hear anybody yell "food fight!" so there was absolutely no warning whatsoever. It just happened.
During the half minute of this chaos, I saw all types of foods flying into the air, along with a few trays. Everyone was screaming their heads off. Most people in the room, who weren't involved, did the right thing and ran for the exits or hid under the tables in order to prevent anymore possible injuries or anything like that. I saw security and teachers running after the kids who started the food fight out of the lunchroom because they bailed. But most of them were caught in the end. Administration and our school cops gathered quickly to get to the bottom of this, and to prevent fights that I think were going to break out as a result of this. All exits from the lunchroom were blocked off so nobody got out. The kids and staff in my program were let out though because we weren't involved, and quite frankly, the kids didn't deserve to be in the middle of all that mess.
The kids in my program were scared, needless to say. Right away, they hid under the tables or moved to the other end of the lunchroom. I personally hid under a table as I didn't want to get hit by any flying materials. I was hit in the head with a tray in the last food fight I was in at my last school, I didn't need that again. Despite a few spatters of food on our shirts, we were all ok. Our teachers and aides checked them out and wiped the spatters off their shirts. The more high functioning kids were mad. They don't know why there was a food fight. I don't know why either, but I guess it was just for fun.
I don't think there were any injuries to any staff or kids during this, which is a very good thing. I know this, though. Had any of the kids in my program been hit and/or injured in this, there would've been hell to pay. And it probably wouldn't have came from me.
The administration was very ticked off about this, needless to say. I don't know what action will be taken, but to the staff: I recommend a stiff punishment, due to the fact the kids from autism were in the room at the time. Like I said, they were scared and they didn't deserve this.
This concludes my post. Questions or comments? Send them here.
UPDATE, 1/27/10: The eight guys who started this were suspended. But the 30 or 40 others who were involved will probably not get disciplinary action since there's no clear video of the incident (there's video cameras in our lunchroom).
9 comments:
great headline, Timmy
Agreed.
Thanks guys. I wanted to make that clear to certain people who thinks everything at Sullivan is fist-i-cuffs.
Wow - what a mess. They should have made the kids that started it clean up everything!
Raz, I believe they may have done that. I'm also told that the eight guys who intiated the fight were suspended from school.
A staff member who shall remain anonymous was hit with a carton of milk during yesterday's mess, right? Well, they're making the kid who did it clean the lunchroom for a month.
Wow. I just had a flash back. I remember it clearly now.
It was the Spring of 1970. We had all just gone thru the lunch line. Porcupine meatballs. You know those greasy little balls that were imbedded with rice to soak of the grease in a rich tomato sauce that tasted like Campbell's soup.
I cant remember who started it, but we had no sooner sat down then there was a big splat on our table. I turned around and was met by a hale of meatballs. We positioned ourselves for retaliation. We jabbed our meatballs with our forks and with a quick flip of the wrist set them sailing in return across the cafeteria.
Everybody joined in. The food was horrible. The lunch ladies squealled for the Vice Principal and diciplanarian. Whap. One landed on his bald head. From then on he was referred to by kids in low whispers as "the meatball".
Oh how these poor children today suffer. Pizza, nachos and hamburgers for lunch.
They should have been subjected to what was commonly called "train wreck". Train wreck was a mysterious combination of what was left over in the Schools refrigerator after a week or two, globbed together into a mysterious stew. If we could have flung that across the room, it would have gone too.
Timmy look back at this incident not in horror, but in fun. I remember the glorious food fight of 1970. Ah those were the days!
WilleG, that sounds like fun. However, personally, I'm not too much a fan of food fights. There were quite a few in my 8th grade year at my last school. I was only in one and while I was trying to leave the lunchroom so I wouldn't get food all over my clothes, I was not only knocked to the floor by nearly 40 kids who were also trying to get out of the room, I was also smacked in the head with a flying tray.
I'm looking at our food fight on Tuesday at Sullivan as "horror" for a few reasons. One, there wasn't no warning signs. It just happened, which sent lots of people running for exits and ducking under tables. People could've gotten seriously hurt in that mess with the way they were running. Two, the kids in my class get scared easliy and this scared them very much. There were a couple of kids who were visibliy shaken, even after we had left the lunchroom. Three, there was a staff member who was assaulted with a carton of milk and they were nearly smacked over the head by a flying tray. Four, and finally, they got really out of hand because they started using trays as flying weapons. They also threw a few chairs ACROSS the room.
If I knew a food fight was going to happen, had they not used trays or chairs as weapons, and had not the kids from my class been in there, I would've said it was fun and I just may have gotten involved.
But this incident is really no laughing matter.
I remember food fights in the lunchroom during the brief time I attended Austin High School. They usually start because someone thinks it would be funny to have one.
But nothing is funny about not being able to have lunch in peace, let alone having to go around the rest of the day with food stains on your good clothes. I'm sure the cafeteria and custodial staff aren't too amused either about having to clean the mess up.
I've got a solution. Cancel lunch for awhile. There are some high schools that allow students to leave the building for lunch. But there are plenty who don't allow freshmen and sophomores to go out, or don't allow any students to go out. If Sullivan has that policy, and lunches are canceled say for a week, maybe rumbling, empty stomachs will make people think twice about acting like they're in a Three Stooges film short.
Dearest, dearest little Timmy.
Thank you for this post. I always enjoy reading about what you young people are up to these days. Again, thank you and bless you little one.
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