Admin’s Prohibition Deflates Senior Tradition

For schools across the nation, the end of the year is a time filled with traditions and send-off celebrations for graduating seniors. As June approaches, Campolindo seniors also look forward to ditch day, the senior sleepover, the senior prank, and, perhaps most anticipated, the assassins game.

For years, seniors have participated in a game in which each player is assigned to a team and each team is assigned an unsuspecting target on an opposing team, with the objective being to douse the target with water from a squirt gun, thus eliminating him or her from the competition.

As a freshman I couldn’t wait for my chance to play the assassins game, but now that I am finally a senior, I feel little more than disappointment.

Last spring, administration banned students from playing the game on campus, sparking outrange among the seniors and causing concern among the juniors who worried the ban would be permanent.

Indeed, their concern was warranted. Associate principal Jon Drury decreed that once again, assassins will not be allowed to be played on school grounds during school hours.

Senior and leadership student Sydney Yuen had hoped this year would be different, but now that the administration is cracking down, the game’s rules have been altered, including the period of time each day in which game play is allowed.

“It was going to be 7 am to midnight, Monday through Friday,” said senior and organizer of the game, Tori Fleming. “But once admin banned us from playing during the school day, I had to change it.”

The Google document shared among senior participants declares, “Shooting will ONLY happen BEFORE and AFTER school hours. 8am-3:05pm on ALL weekdays are OFF LIMITS.”

Some seniors, like Kelly Ruane, actually prefer the new schedule. “Being able to play at school would make the entire day just super stressful, and I wasn’t really excited to sprint from class to class and everything,” she said.

John Cirelli said he was “indifferent” because he and his team were going to “hunt down [their] targets outside of school anyway.”

But most seniors, including myself, are bummed by the new rules.

“I know that it can be disruptive and it doesn’t make teachers too happy,” said Spirit Coordinator and senior Alex Corallo, “but it’s 1 of the biggest senior traditions at this school and not being able to play on campus defeats the purpose of this being a school tradition.”

Senior Giorgio Alessandria is “really annoyed” that seniors can’t play during school. “It takes away from 1 of the best aspects of the game: terror at school,” he said.

I agree: while staking out and hunting down targets around town may be fun, it should be an added bonus to the school-centered game, not the entirety of it.

Personally, I feel that the new rules hinder the true spirit of the game. At the end of the day, assassins is a senior tradition that should be played at school. The past few years have turned the game from a senior tradition to an extracurricular activity.

Obviously, instruction should not be interrupted during class time, but as students arrive in the parking lot, walk the halls between classes, lounge at brunch and lunch, or use the restroom, they should experience the stress and paranoia at the heart of this senior rite of passage.