Cherry Hill High School East - Eidolon Yearbook (Cherry Hill, NJ)

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Walking through East, you can easily perceive that a self-selective segregating process is at work., Black leather jackets talk to other black leather jackets. Bangles and beads are by the far cafeteria wall and the Izods have a table with a view of the courtyard. But at least once during the course of the day, students are grouped regardless of personality types or fashion state- ments., This insidius agent which none can escape is called Home- room. For 15 minutes every morn- ing approximately 30 people with perhaps nothing more in common than the first letter of their last name are herded into homerooms for the daily process of taking at- tendance, scrounging for Guid- ance passes, receiving cuts for non-existent classes, and not hear- ing the announcements. Think about it, you’ve spent a total of 7.5 days of your high school career with these people. That’s certain- ly not a fleeting encounter. In fact, there is an odd camaraderie with- in these motley groups. A sense of ennui bonds you together as you chatter away the minutes until the bell summons you to first period. You watch each other copy friends' homework assignments, cram for bio tests, and correct typ- ing errors in term papers. Togeth- er, you discuss the latest news and gossip, attempting to speak coher- ently through the early morning mental haze. As the fog slowly dis- appears and the eyes are able to focus again, it’s time to leave homeroom and face the day ahead. Some students though, teachers are rumored to whisper, never do escape from homeroom but pass their entire day in that glorious haze. “Steve, can you hear me? Steve, Steve, are you there? Please an- swer me? Steve ...” “Excuse me Mrs. Smith, did you say something?” 93

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In The Course Of A Normal Day . . . . . . And Attention all teachers: Execute Proce- dure 19. Please make a visual search of the immediate area.” When this omi- nous message is broadcast over the loudspeaker system, teachers and stu- dents alike are startled. Pencils stop scribbling, chalk is held poised in mid- air. The test which seemed so crucial a moment ago has now vanished from the students’ minds. The only thought mixed among the students’ and teach- ers’ fright and anger is the idea that somewhere in Cherry Hill East there could be a bomb ready to explode! Procedure 19 is the procedure the ad- ministration has devised to handle bomb threats. Cherry Hill East’s bomb threats began in 1981 when a student placed a pipe bomb in a locker. Fortu- nately, the bomb did not explode but the community was extremely upset and school was forced to close for a day and a half. Since then several people, ignoring the true gravity of the situa- tion, have phoned in fake bomb threats to East. While they thoughtlessly laugh over their irresponsible and immature 92 Pran Cherry Hill East is temporarily paralyzed. When Procedure 19 is an- nounced, teachers make a visual search of the classroom, looking for a con- cealed explosive device. Then comes the frightening part — the waiting. The school is not evacuated because of the possible danger posed to passing stu- dents and teachers by the possible ex- plosion of a locker or any metallic ob- ject. Instead, everyone sits in the class- rooms and waits, praying that there is not a bomb hidden in the locker outside the classroom or in the trashcan down the hall. As the threat is discovered to be false and school slowly returns to life, there is much anger in East. The needless in- terruption caused in the learning pro- cess is reason enough to be angry; yet, when weighed against other reasons, it is not a very important one. Far more anger is generated as administrators, teachers, and students realize that somebody is toying with their lives. Bomb threats are not harmless pranks. They involve a potential loss of life; the possibility of death has been ushered into the school. Cherry Hill East is transformed from a world of friend- ships and intellectual growth to a nightmarish world in which the most harmless object gains the potential for injury. The innocence and trust com- mon in most teenagers is pushed aside, abandoning them to distrust and fear. It becomes a very scary and insecure world for everyone involved. Those people staging the pranks either fail to realize the emotional implica- tions of their actions or are indifferent to them. Their actions are, at worst, acts of bitterness and cruelty, at best, acts of immaturity. In either case, the bomb threats must stop. Students and teachers cannot afford the distractions. As professionals, they cannot spare the time consumed by the threats. As peo- ple, they should be spared the emotion- al upheaval of such an incident. Those people placing the threats must learn the value and blessings of life. For when they respect life and other people’s de- sire to lead a normal, stable life, the threats will stop — as they should -and Procedure 19 will cease to exist.

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