If anyone has tried to use the elevator here at school, they doubtless have run into a teacher more than willing to inform them of their mistake. Almost every time my laziness gets the best of me and I decide to use the elevator instead of making the trek up the stairs, I am confronted by a teacher who almost seems to relish in the chance to tell me how wrong I am and how harmful it is to the community when I take the easier route.
That may be a small exaggeration. But still. Whenever a teacher and I have this discussion in the elevator about how I shouldn’t be there, I have to bite my tongue to keep from snapping back at them. It especially gets me when the staff bases their “Student-Free Zone” elevator policy on the principle of inconveniencing the disabled people here on campus.
Don’t get me wrong. I know that the elevator is first and foremost for the kids and staff here who can’t use the stairs, for one reason or another, and that they should get priority. I agree. But what I DON’T agree with is the idea that when a student uses the elevator they are inconveniencing those people, but when a teacher does, it’s fine.
How is it any different? If a student in a wheelchair is late to class because they had to wait for the people in the elevator before them to finish, does it really make a difference whether those people were students or teachers? I don’t think so.
The staff is using a double standard. I don’t care what the rule is: whether anyone who wants to can use the elevator, or whether only those with a disability can. But whichever it is, it needs to be THE rule, the one that everyone is held accountable to.
Right now, the school-wide rule is that only those with an elevator pass are allowed to use the elevator. So ONLY those with elevator passes should be held accountable, including the very staff who are so quick to enforce this regulation.
