By EMILY HOFFMAN
This past Monday, the United States Secretary of Education, Betsy DeVos, announced that the unspoken “15 minute rule” in academic settings will be legalized in 2018. “College Students Were Right,” the Washington Post reported this week on the new legislation.
For those who are unfamiliar, the 15-minute rule is the social norm that students have adopted over the years. If a professor, coach, teacher, or guest lecturer shows up 15 or more minutes late, you can leave without any consequences.
Making my way through high school, any time a teacher was not in the front of the classroom at the start of class, murmurs would fill the air: “Only 14 more minutes and we can leave.” From electing the first African-American man as president to marching in the Women’s March to winning the Valentine’s Day lottery in the pub my freshman year, I am proud to say that yet again I have lived through another major event in history.
After reading the news, I have been sitting extra far on the edge of my seat when a teacher begins to approach the 15 minute mark. This past Wednesday, I decided to make a bold and risky decision and blow off my reading responses to book it to the bar for Tuesday Blues. I sat down in the spinning desk chair in class the next morning. Anxiously shaking my right leg and tapping it on the ground, my eyes soared across the lines in the chapter of the book I was supposed to read for discussion. “I can do this,” I said under my breath. The mantra from the movie The Help filled my mind: “You is kind. You is smart. And you is important.”
I looked at the clock on the wall, conveniently placed above the wide open door leading out to the free world. The teacher was three minutes late – a gift one might say. I looked up from my textbook and noticed the murmurs beginning across the classroom. “We only have to make it 12 more minutes.”
As the big hand on the clock made the final 10-second descent to mark 15 minutes, everyone followed suit and began to sit as far as they could on the edge of their spinny chair. The teacher came running in at 15:30 as we all flew out of the room. As I ran away, my hair flipped to one side of my shoulder as I quickly turned my head. I saw the boy who began the murmurs passionately throw his book on the ground as he shouted, “Check The Hill News” and split out the door.
To all of the teachers who showed up 17 minutes late and continued to give us absences, this one is for you. To all the teachers who would show up 14 minutes late, you know what you’ve done wrong.