From movies to TV, American teen culture features lockers as the necessary right of passage every high-schooler experiences. The truth is, lockers have lost their allure and purpose, and schools are noticing.
“It’s a pretty big change that has taken place over the last few years,” said Sean Connor, a principal with Pfluger Architects, a Texas company that works in school construction. “It used to be the standard to provide individual lockers for every student. Now, the standard is no lockers or, at most, just a few.”
Large and metropolitan high schools have removed lockers all together, as it reduces useless space in the school. Many schools have moved away from using textbooks and paper assignments, there is no need store large textbooks and.
“It used to be that students there weren’t assigned a locker until they turned in their emergency contact forms. But so few students cared about having a locker, they didn’t bother turning in the forms.” Katie Schroder, a junior at Broad Run High School in Ashburn, told the Washington Post, “The school quickly got wise and changed the conditions: turn in the forms or no WiFi access. The missing forms were soon submitted.”
Langston Hughes Middle School, a South Lakes pyramid member and neighbor, will be undergoing major renovations in 2019, decided they not be including lockers in the design (as of last June).
The question remains for South Lakes and many other overcrowded schools; are lockers merely nostalgia lining our halls or a necessity for the modern student?