Our school staff works hard for the school. From cleaning our campus to teaching us in classrooms, there’s a section of staff we nearly forget about. The Lunch Ladies/Men! I know, I know. You’re probably thinking about “who cares about the staff” or “they just serve us lunch”.

Well that’s incorrect. Our lunch staff comes early in the mornings and stays until the afternoon to make sure our meals are fully prepared. In my opinion they are very much underrated. Imagine yourself getting a job doing this all the time. I can see that not everyone in the world has the dream of becoming apart of  school lunch staff; however, someone has to do it. From other sources it has been said that the people who work in the cafeteria didn’t originally like the idea but that it’s a good job.

We all know how high school kids are in general, especially at lunch (Fridays being the most hectic). Students are ready to let loose lall their energy out from being kept in all day in desks and having to sit still.

From my observations, students don’t care about how they treat the kitchen staff. Freshman are the biggest offenders of this because they haven’t matured enough yet.

For example an anonymous junior student has seen examples of this. ¨A couple of days ago I had passed by the amphitheatre with my friends as usual and as I was walking I saw [freshman] students effortlessly throw food away on the ground in front of the cafeteria staff, or say rude comments on how the food tastes”, they said.

Now after hearing this I do understand the phrase ¨words don’t hurt¨ and perhaps the kids were joking just to get laughs but I’m sure it is still found to be rude and disrespectful.

Ahead of time I hope that whoever reads this article can walk away with a different mindset towards our staff here at Pitman and not just the kitchen staff, but the campos, the new principal, the teachers and even  the janitorial service.

You don’t have to sit down and have a nice chat with them but courtesy every now and then. If they give you a comment that you may not like, take it and act as a mature highschool student. Imagine being in their shoes and what you would do or how you would feel if students were treating you without respect.

Also remember that the staff is just doing their job. I hope every student and parent can really take into consideration that the staff are people too.