It’s 11:50 in the ULab when teachers let class out. I rush down the stairs from my third-floor classroom and stand at the crosswalk waiting for the light to change. It’s 11:52. I make it to the theater doorway and impatiently wait for someone to open the door for me. It’s 11:54 when I make it into the commons, a line already wrapping around the commons.

Around school the exact same thing is happening: students get let out early to beat the lunch line, but it doesn’t help. Letting students out just makes lunch start artificially sooner.

The Commons Cafe is at its worst when there is an overabundance of people. Fighting my way through a horde of high schoolers for the chance to get a slice of pizza is not my ideal lunch situation. There’s no room to breathe.

Additionally, many people who have sensory issues can not handle being in the high school equivalent of a mosh pit just to get some lunch.
Except when everyone lines up in a straight line, it is also bad. Not only does it feel long, but it takes long as well. There have been days where I have gotten in line and have had to wait until 12:15 to get food, only ten minutes before lunch ends. That is just not enough time to eat.
If you don’t want to deal with the lunch line you have only one option: go off campus. As an underclassman, I do not have permission to go off campus which leaves me with one option, eat at the commons.

One solution would be to make lunch longer. This gives upperclassmen more time to go off campus, alleviating some of the burden. Lunch could also be split into two sections like for the middle school, a first lunch and a second lunch with office hours in the place of “recess.” With an added set office hours, we could take 15 minutes from community time just as the middle school does, while still retaining the same total amount of office hours.

UPrep has evolved a lot in the past year, with a new building, a new gym and more classrooms, not to mention more students, and yet the commons has stayed the same. If UPrep keeps enrolling more students, the commons will only become more congested. No matter what UPrep chooses to do, one thing is for certain: the commons can’t remain stagnant. It has to evolve just as UPrep has.