As students enter their final weeks of school, which are characterized by Regents review and over-blasted air conditioning, they are beginning to reflect on the past 10 months. As a student body we have had to deal once more with a tragic loss. We have also seen a slow reduction of our privileges, although we have failed to speak out against them with conviction. Instead of trying to regain our rights, we have shirked our responsibilities, assuming the Student Union (SU) will resolve the issues.

Unfortunately, the SU, which is supposed to constantly interact with the student body, has continued to keep its doors tightly shut. It has failed to deliver many of the reforms and changes promised. For example, in the June 2, 2008, issue of The Spectator, SU President James Kim said, “We also want to improve the club/pub experience by expanding the number of rooms available in the grid administration.”

Kim and Vice President Casey Griffin never followed through on such a course of action. In fact, students were all but unable to reserve rooms for the first couple months of the year, when the SU Web site wasn’t even running. While a new version of stuysu.org has since been put up, it still lacks the old grid feature for reserving rooms.

During the year, conflicts emerged with the administration, which has enacted several regulations controlling what we wear, what we sell, where we eat, when we eat and where we are allowed to hang out. This has left some students frustrated at their inability to voice their opinions. Others have merely grown apathetic towards any actions the administration takes.

And though moves have been made to protest these changes—such as “Stuy Dress Code Day,” an event in which students wore overly formal clothes to mock the new enforcement of the dress code—most have lacked popular support. Students protest in various Facebook groups, but the commitment ends there.

In order to bring about real change, protest cannot be solely virtual. Speaking up more at Student Leadership Team meetings as well as communicating in a more concise manner with the administration will show them that we are committed to reform.

This is not to say that the student body should be speaking out against every action that the administration takes. The policy of using metal detector wands during Advanced Placement Exams was opposed strongly by students who felt as though their personal freedoms were being taken away. However, the policy ended up being appropriate—students had cell phones confiscated that otherwise could have been used to cheat. And though we often feel as though the administration does not trust us enough, we must recognize that it is their job—as well as ours—to help uphold academic honesty at Stuyvesant.

In terms of bringing about necessary change, the student body has not been completely passive. One positive action the SU took was the holding of a Students’ Forum, a student-led discussion that addressed many current policy issues at Stuyvesant. The Open Forum gave the students a way to talk about the problems facing them as well as present ways to appeal to the administration.

We have also demonstrated our ability to develop a sense of community during difficult times. A tragedy befell us earlier this year: the death of senior Ava Hecht. Many students attended Ava’s funeral, a Celebration of Life that included speakers and performances, and a Tree Ceremony, all of which honored her memory. In a school where the student body can often seem segregated, we managed to handle the situation maturely and join together in order to cope with the loss of a peer.

However, as unfortunate as it is, it took an unexpected, tragic death to create a sense of community at Stuyvesant. It’s important that we unify more often than just when participating in SING!, when attending an Open Forum, or when dealing with tragedy. We need to start the 2009-2010 school year with immediate efforts to bring about reform. We can negotiate with Teitel, who has proposed revoking the out to lunch privileges of the incoming freshmen. We can take down the doors leading into the SU, as not only a practical change, but also as a symbol of our attempt to increase communication to the SU and the student body. We can bring about change. It is just a matter of motivation.