After a long day of school, nothing is worse than a person being greeted with a slip of paper poking out of their windshield wipers. Recently the number of violations have been going up, and students are talking about it. Often, the person receiving the ticket accepts that they were in the wrong and calls it a day. However, according to Stephaine Kosmas ‘24, sometimes it happens to be a misunderstanding that shouldn’t be given any consequence at all.
“Last year I pulled a ligament and had to wear a cast, and I was parking in the handicap in the S-lot, and I was constantly getting violations,” Kosmas said. ”There was a specific hall monitor who would yell at me about it almost every day.”
Kosmas said that this hall monitor, who has since been let go, once took the initiative to stop her from leaving the parking lot until he was done confronting her about parking in the spot she had permission to.
“After I told the office about what happened, he stopped telling me where to park, but he still wasn’t very nice to me,” Kosmas said.
Although Kosmas confirmed she hasn’t had trouble with violations so far this year. However, she does believe the reasons behind why some people receive them don’t seem very violation-worthy and that the rules should be relaxed.
“One of my friends said that I could park in her spot, but they refused to let me park there because I didn’t pay for it,” Kosmas said.
Of course, there are plenty of reasons why certain rules regarding parking and vehicle requirements are in place, and Kosmas acknowledges their importance. However, she feels as though whoever is giving these violations has the responsibility to look at a situation from multiple perspectives before determining the intentions were bad and punishing students right away.
“I really don’t think that people parking in the S-lot go out of their way to violate the rules, Kosmas said. “Especially since most high schoolers are new to driving, a warning could make all the difference.”