By EILEEN CHANG
A new locker policy, introduced last spring, is now effective this school year. According to the policy, students purchase the combination to their locker from Stuyvesant for 11 dollars.
Juniors were given the chance to select their locker number through the student tools section of the official Stuyvesant Web site. Students in other grades were assigned lockers randomly.
Principal Stanley Teitel met with Student Union (SU) representatives in June to discuss letting juniors choose their own lockers.
“All [the administration] wants to know is who is in what lock,” said senior and SU President Jamila Ma. “If that’s all they want to know, why not let students have a choice where their lockers are?”
The administration and the SU decided that since the plan was newly proposed, it would be too difficult to let the entire student body choose lockers the first year.
The junior class was chosen by seniority. “The problem with the senior class is that the senior bar makes it more complicated. We didn’t want it to be that the person with fastest computer gets the best locker,” said Ma. “We couldn’t get the seniors so we picked the junior class.”
Ma said the SU doesn’t like that all the locks have keyholes, as Teitel had promised there would be no keyholes on the locks. She said, “It’s definitely something we have to talk to [Teitel] about because he said it wouldn’t happen and it did.”
Assistant Principal Technology Edward Wong created the locker selection application, which was open the week of August 8. Students were informed of the selection process through a posting on the school Web site.
The selection process was on a first-come, first-serve basis. Juniors who did not participate were randomly assigned a locker.
“Within two days, out of the 800 lockers we have, 600 were already spoken for,” said Teitel. “I’m guessing the other 200 [students] were either out of the country and had no idea or their attitude was wherever my locker is, that’s where it is.”
Junior Christina Moll said, “I like the freedom to choose lockers on our own personal interests but I had trouble figuring out their locations just based on numbers. I wish there was a map on the Web site.”
The lockers were distributed by grade. Seniors were assigned lockers on the first and second floors, while juniors were allowed to choose lockers on the third and fourth floors and part of the fifth floor. Sophomores received the rest of the fifth floor, in addition to the sixth and the seventh floors.
Freshmen lockers are located on the the eighth and ninth floors. Due to the limited number of lockers, freshmen will be required to share, as they have done in the past.
“You’ve got the same floors you always had,” said Teitel. “Obviously the younger you are, the higher up you go.”
To use their lockers, students are required to print out a letter, available in the student tools section of the school Web site, and to have their parents sign it. This letter must then be submitted with 11 dollars to the office of Assistant Principal Organization Randi Damesek.
Damesek’s staff will register students as they pay. An e-mail, containing the locker combination and instructions, will be sent to students’ inboxes within 48 hours.
Teitel said the locker policy is on a year-long trial run. It may or may not be implemented next year depending on the number of thefts that occur this year. If the amount of theft does not decline significantly, the locker policy will not be implemented after next year.
“If the number [of thefts] has plummeted [this year], as I hope, we will continue,” said Teitel. “If the number has not changed significantly, the question is why are we doing all of this work?”
“The real reason [for the locker policy] was theft,” said Teitel. “Part of the problem is that a lot of our students had desirable locks. They look fancy, but in reality, they provided little or no security.”
The administration purchased four-digit combination locks, which Teitel said will “be able to decrease thefts tremendously.”
Sophomore Ruthia Chen said, “Even though I envy the juniors for being able to choose their own lockers, I’m grateful I won’t get my stuff stolen.”
Over the summer, Wong, mechanic Kern Levigion and computer technician Sydney Lindsey made preparations for the locker policy. They ordered boxes of locks, cleaned out and renovated all 2,911 lockers for use, placed locks on lockers and set up a database of locker combinations. Several students taking health classes helped put locks on the lockers.
Levigion repaired broken lockers. The repairs, which included replacing broken doors, divider panels and shelves, took four-and-a-half weeks. “The repairs needed to be done . It was long overdue,” he said. “It should not have to be done for years.”
“It does take work to lock all these lockers. It isn’t a ten-minute job to put on 2900-plus locks,” said Teitel. “I don’t mind doing the work or at least having personnel do it but the benefit has to be that you guys don’t get ripped off.”