Not all traditions are good

Every school has their traditions — especially high school seniors. Since the first year of high school, each freshman looks forward to senior "privileges," for example: Senior Skip Day, Senior Cheers, Senior Pranks and, most of all, the Senior Class Picture.

Ever since we can recall, members of the Columbia Falls High School senior class participated in the taking of street signs to hold in the senior photo every fall. Signs like College Avenue, Memory Lane, various construction signs, and streets with ordinary last names are the most commonly taken. As seniors this year, we were excited to partake in the traditions we "rightfully" earned.

Well, it was all fun and games until we realized the consequences of our actions when a police officer came to our school and read us our rights.

We wanted to make the community aware of this tradition and why it's not as great of an idea as we thought it to be. Through Youth Court, the Center for Restorative Youth Justice, and a victim/offender conference, we came to an agreement between both parties on our restitution.

The most important part of our agreement was to stop the street sign tradition at CFHS and get our communities aware of what has wrongfully been going on for years.

We also have realized what we did wrong and how our actions have negatively affected others in ways we never considered.

We hope our experience will enlighten the upcoming seniors of all high schools, that just because it's a tradition it's not necessarily a good one.

Khristina M. Smith

Jessica Ferretti

Emily Nelson

Sarah Dempsey

Shaundra K. Savage