[palo alto] traditional egg fight lands students in trouble
Michael Snyder
Egg fight lands Palo Alto students in trouble
Henry K. Lee, Chronicle Staff Writer
Friday, October 30, 2009
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(10-29) 15:51 PDT PALO ALTO -- Several students at Palo Alto High School
have been suspended for taking part in a traditional egg fight that
turned a bit brutal, school officials said today.
The annual egg fight between juniors and seniors is usually messy at
worst, but this year resulted in minor injuries because some of the
ovoid weapons apparently were frozen, officials said.
The egg fight, which takes place during the school's "Spirit Week," is
often held in woods at Stanford University. But Tuesday night, at least
100 students intending to battle it out were discouraged by campus
police, and went to rival Gunn High School in Palo Alto instead.
Several students came out of the fight with bruises, possibly after
being hit with frozen eggs, said Linda Common, an assistant
superintendent with the Palo Alto Unified School District.
An undisclosed number of students have been suspended, Common said.
The students who participated "knew it wasn't appropriate because they
didn't use their own facilities," Common said.
The student government at Palo Alto High has written a letter of apology
to Gunn High and is scheduling a meeting with campus representatives
there, Common said.
In a statement, Palo Alto High student body president Osceola Ward said,
"It is extremely unfortunate that a select group of students decided to
negatively channel their energy in the senseless destruction of school
property, but I know that these spurious acts do not mirror the
collective attitude of our school and community."
The egg fight, dubbed "Egg Wars," has been a tradition at Palo Alto High
for years, unless students are intercepted by the police. Last year,
police caught some students and forced them to clean up the mess, one
student said.
A student familiar with the event but who declined to be named said the
suspensions were unfair. A group of students wore black and held a
sit-in protest on campus today.
"The school administration is giving students unreasonable punishment,"
she said. "Most of the students are being suspended just in time for
college applications. As a student, I understand why the administration
is upset with Egg Wars, but after talking with fellow students, in no
way was this a prank against Gunn High School."
She added, "A punishment that better fits the crime would be community
service. Suspension is extreme, especially since it may ruin our
futures. Many students who have been suspended had clean records and are
exemplary students."
Chronicle staff writer Jill Tucker contributed to this report. E-mail
Henry K. Lee at hl...@sfchronicle.com.
Poe
Gotta give credit to the kid who thought of the frozen eggs!
JonesieCat
"Poe" <hau...@terrible-thought.com> wrote in message
news:7lp5djF...@mid.individual.net...
I don't think he/she was any genius. Why not skip the freezing process and
just pick up egg-sized rocks? How do these kinds of traditions endure???!
Or - how quickly would a frozen egg defrost, I wonder?
jc
earthage
Just think about how differently this would be reported if this had
been
Richmond High School. Palo Alto High School (also public like
Richmond)
is considered a feeder school into Stanford and the ivy league
colleges.
http://voice.paly.net/view_story.php?id=199
Fifty years ago, it was simple. If you wanted to go to Harvard, you
went to prep school at Choate or Andover. If you wanted to go to
Princeton, you went to St. George's or Deerfield. The same went for
Yale and Exeter. Times have changed, but a clear pipeline from certain
high schools and prep schools to the nation's most elite universities
still exists, according to a recent Worth magazine article.
This pipeline, while more easily visible on the East Coast, is also
apparent in California and specifically at Palo Alto High School.
Worth magazine, which ranked schools by the percent of students that
matriculated to Harvard, Yale and Princeton, placed Palo Alto High
School among the top 50 public schools in the nation. Paly was also
one of only three schools in California on the list, with 26 students
attending Harvard, Yale and Princeton from 1998 to 2002, according to
Worth.
While getting a Paly diploma is hardly an invitation to the Ivies, it
is hard to dispute the fact that many schools actively seek Paly
students.
earthage
> JonesieCat wrote:
> > "Poe" <hau...@terrible-thought.com> wrote in message
> > news:7lp5djF...@mid.individual.net...
> > > Michael Snyder wrote:
> > >> http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/10/29/BA9H1ACEAN.DTL
> > >>
> > >>
> > >> Egg fight lands Palo Alto students in trouble
> > >>
> > >> Henry K. Lee, Chronicle Staff Writer
> > >>
> > >> Friday, October 30, 2009
> > >> Print E-mail deliciousdel.icio.us
> > >> (10-29) 15:51 PDT PALO ALTO -- Several students at
I also wanted to add that Gunn High School is also a very good school.
Of course these schools are located in rather affluant areas. But
Gunn has not been without its own problems this year. Since earlier
this year there have been a number of train track suicides.
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-student-suicides30-2009oct30,0,6600846.story
Dickens was the fourth Gunn student in less than six months to commit
suicide near where East Meadow Drive crosses the Caltrain tracks here
in the affluent, high-achieving heart of the Silicon Valley. A fifth
student tried to kill himself but was thwarted by his mother, who
suspected his intentions, followed him to the crossing and saved him
with the help of a passer-by.
snip
The crossing itself is plain, weedy and less than two miles from the
Gunn campus. Some have requested that a permanent memorial be erected
at the site, but the last thing Caltrain wants is to romanticize the
suicides or create a safety hazard. Train crews would "have to see
that every day," Dunn said, "and it's very painful for them."
snip
Jean-Paul Blanchard, 17, walked onto the tracks in front of a fast-
moving train on May 5, during the two-week period that Gunn students
were taking Advanced Placement tests, which grant them college credit
and confer prestige upon their schools. Early talk blamed the region's
high standards for causing undue pressure.
Then, on June 2, Sonya Raymakers, 17, ended up at the same crossing,
with the same result. But she had already been accepted at New York
University, so the pressure theory lost some currency. Catrina Holmes,
13, was the incoming freshman who died on Aug. 21. Dickens, a junior,
killed himself three-tenths of a mile from the same spot.
JonesieCat
"earthage" <eartha...@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:b3588a51-11b3-4151...@r31g2000vbi.googlegroups.com...
It reminded me of "muck up" day here many private high schools have in which
graduating seniors pull stunts. Sure is different from the high jinks pulled
at Richmond, isn't it? I'm biased against Richmond now I'm afraid. Instead
of eggs, there they'd be throwing homemade molatov cocktails, using one of
those half gallon vodka bottles perhaps. That school administration is SO
toast. (Darn it, we just knew that corner of the grounds was bad. We were
just waiting for something to happen.)
jc
Michael Snyder
Coulda hard-boiled 'em. Slightly less rock-like, but still...