As students pour into the SCHS hallways, the first eye-catching feature that many notice are the lockers. A staple of average high school culture and a highlight of media featuring teenage life, locker usage has seen a significant decrease across campus.
With the popularity and idea of using lockers slowly disappearing, junior Samuel Eveleth observed that the rise of technology replacing physical textbooks is a major reason why the hype has declined.
“I feel like a lot of people would put their textbooks in their locker because of how heavy they were and with the back problems they could cause, but now that lots of them are online, the necessity for lockers for those in particular has decreased,” Eveleth said.
Additionally, math teacher Lauren Hasty explained that alongside the decrease of physical textbooks, the inconvenience of locker placements throughout the school added more reason for students not to use them.
“The con (of using lockers) is maybe if you left your stuff in your locker and you’re on the other side of campus at your class, then you have to go all the way to wherever your locker is to open your locker and get something out,” Hasty said.
Adapting to the decrease in locker use, some students have found alternative ways to store their heavier belongings. Eveleth remarked that his storage place revolves around his daily schedule and what is most convenient.
“Now I have a schedule where I can place my bags in the music room, so I don’t use it (his locker) that much,” Eveleth said.
Similar to Eveleth, freshman Alyssa Katelyn Garcia shared that she too has not found much use for her locker throughout her first year of high school, but for different reasons.
“I actually haven’t really figured out where my locker is, and for me personally, I don’t really like using lockers because I don’t bring a lot of stuff,” Garcia said.
While some like Garcia feel their lockers rarely serve any purpose to them, freshman Anagha Dhurjati finds hers to be a helpful space to store athletic gear.
“I use it to store my badminton racket and bag… because I don’t like carrying it around since I’m already carrying my backpack. It’s sometimes too much to carry everything around,” Dhurjati said.
While lockers may serve as a convenient way to store belongings to some and difficult and unnecessary for others, Eveleth believes they are still a staple of SCHS that should be kept for those who need them.
“I have my bags and I know where to put them, so I don’t find any use for lockers as much,” Eveleth said. “But I think they should be available.”
Growing up in the eighties, Hasty’s locker not only served as a space for him to store textbooks but a place to create precious high school memories as well. Though lockers are not as prominent in high school as they used to be, they remain a point of reminiscing for many.
“I have a fond recollection of my locker. I used it to put a bunch of stickers (outside) and put a bunch of stickers inside, and I think sometimes you might have a locker mate,” Hasty said. “It’s almost a nostalgic thing.”