I stood in the doorway and began to speak. The coach looked at me and raised her eyebrows. I wasn’t a pretty sight: a barely five-and-a-half-foot tall freshman with crew-cut hair, tight jeans and a baggy shirt. And my voice, at an octave higher than your average eighth grade girl, left much to be desired. Still, I was able to utter the following: “I’m Wyndam Makowsky. I’m with The Spectator.”
That was my first interview for my first article— a recap of the JV girls’ volleyball team’s undefeated season. Since then, The Spectator took over my high school career and shaped it accordingly; now I sit at my desk, a six-foot-tall senior with a mop head, a former Editor in Chief, hanging it up after a four-year run.
As a student, I’ve been afforded all the good that Stuyvesant has to offer: first-rate instruction, opportunities to pursue every passion I have and the priceless camaraderie amongst friends. Stuyvesant has provided me with the best four years of my life, and I challenge anyone to find another high school that equals it.
But, as with anything else, Stuyvesant has its shortcomings. While on the Spectator, I became familiar with Stuyvesant’s underbelly: a political environment that constantly pits students against administrators and prevents any side from taking significant strides toward making Stuyvesant a better school.
Here is where I am supposed to make my stump speech in favor of student rebellion against the school’s totalitarian forces. In my last article, I am supposed to galvanize the student body and set them on a course of action.
But I cannot do that; I do not believe in that.
Polarization solves nothing. So instead, let’s journey toward the center. When problems arise, the most effective way to solve them is to actively bring together people on both sides of the issue so that a resolution can be hashed out. In truth, the only way to get the administration to listen to student qualms is to meet them halfway between our viewpoint and theirs. As elementary as it sounds, this is perhaps the most meaningful lesson I’ve learned at Stuyvesant.
As students, we will always face situations in which our rights may be infringed upon; we should never stop fighting to prevent such instances from occurring. But we also have to realize that we already have so much—even the outto- lunch policy, which many of us consider a birthright, is nothing more than a privilege.
To the administration, I would say this: There will surely come a time when you feel it necessary to enact policies that may limit students in order to help and protect them. But Stuyvesant students are the best in the city; when composing such guidelines, remember that restrictive rules that may be needed elsewhere will generally not be needed here.
Everyone at Stuyvesant should have the same goal: to provide students with an excellent education, as well as an enjoyable high school experience. But in order to achieve that goal, we must not take divisive actions—we must cooperate. I have faith in this school, its students, its faculty, its administration.
Stuyvesant has never disappointed me before; I doubt it will start now.
