Angelene Woo
Signs were put up around campus in regards to Dalat International
School’s new campus construction. One of these signs had a comma splice, and
English teachers Bethany Weidemann and Emily Grad decided to take the matter
into their own hands.
The school year of 2015-2016 saw the start of the construction of
Dalat International School’s new campus. Signs were placed around campus
warning students of the dangers of the construction work and expressing the
need for caution. One such sign requested that the students kindly welcome the
construction workers as Dalat’s guests. This sign, however, contained a ghastly
flaw! Dalat International School, who prides itself on producing students with
perfect grammar—mostly thanks to Tommy Tompkins—, printed a comma splice on
signs all over campus! A comma splice is a serious offence and is defined by
Dictionary.com as, “the use of a comma, rather than a semicolon, colon, or
period, to join two independent clauses in the absence of a coordinating
conjunction.” (See picture below).
Disgusted, Weidemann and Grad trekked around the campus one
afternoon, laboring to manually fix the comma splice with their nifty markers.
With one dot, they transformed the comma, on three signs, into a semicolon.
Clearly these actions were premeditated, but what was Weidemann and Grad’s
motive? Did they earnestly hope to educate Dalat students? Or did they wish to
provoke the authorities?
When asked of her motive, Grad simply replied, “I have no
comments; I will not speak without my lawyer.”
Many other questions arise: “Should the school board address this
issue as an act of vandalism?” and “Should they, as teachers, face consequences
for poor role modeling?”
Page 43 of Dalat’s Student and Parent Handbook says, “Not being
respectful towards property owned by the school, teachers, or other students,
including theft and vandalism, will
be subject to major disciplinary action.”
Will the authorities take action to discipline these outrageous
rebels? Or will faculty be above the law?
This is so funny! And interesting.
ReplyDeleteThanks so much!
ReplyDelete