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January: The Unwritten Codes of School
In addition to raging against expectations, Frankie also rails against the unwritten codes of her school, such as who gets to sit at the senior table. What are the unwritten codes and rules at your own school? Has anyone ever tried to defy them? What were the consequences? 
9 comments:
Ooo. Unwritten codes at my school. I went to a wealthy school so no one could know my mom made all my clothes. I flew under the radar on scholarship and homemade clothes the whole way.
Now, I wouldn't care, but then it was a big deal.
I was too involved with being a nerd to be aware of any unwritten codes. Maybe one...the nerds always get the front row in a classroom and the slackers always get the back row?
As I saw, I was totally clueless about the goings-on...thank the heavens!!
All the "cool" seniors had lockers in "jock hall", but I missed official senior registration day, and one of my best friends was only a junior, so she and I shared a locker with another friend who managed to score a cool jock hall locker. 3 people in one locker = insane. In retrospect I wish I had been more like FLB!
At my school, there definitely is a place for the "cool" kids and a place for the others, like different lunch tables, front and back of the classroom/school bus (like Susan said), and more. I don't think anyone has every tried to defy it because I don't think anyone really cares... I know some people flit between the two groups without any consequences.
My school is pretty academic though, so sometimes the nerds are cooler than the cool kids. :)
How interesting, Lorie Ann, that your mother made your clothes. Did you like that? Do you have pictures of any of your favorites?
The rules we're mentioning are all established by the people they affect--not rules school administrators set. Do we establish these rules because we are comfortable following them? Do most of us like these rules?
If most of us are following the rules, as we seem to be, does that mean they're good rules?
Woo hoo for homemade clothes and hand-me-downs!
I think it's somehow comfortable to follow the rules. In order to get beyond them, there's a period of discomfort (where people judge you for not conforming, maybe)... but it's sweeter on the other side of the rules, I think. For me that happened around junior year of high school, when I finally had enough confidence to ditch the unwritten codes and be me.
One of the codes at my college was "pretend you don't work." Meaning, you never talked about grades, you never admitted to caring about them, you only talked about how you were behind, how you blew something off, how you didn't do the reading.
It was cool to study at the last minute or pull an all nighter -- because that showed that you hadn't been organized or on top of things from the get-go.
I think ambition was somehow vulgar.
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