BACK To SCHOOL

Meals On Wheels

Area high-school students fight for their right
to eat lunch outside their school halls.

MARA REINSTEIN JEWISH NEWS INTERN

Seth Weingarten, Julie
Kaplan and Stephanie
Zameck dine at
Brueggers.

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y the time the high school
lunch bell rings, some stu-
dents are already half-way
to the parking lot. Eating in
a high-school cafeteria, they
say, is more humiliating than be-
ing caught snoring in class.
And, when they stroll back
into the classroom, it's with a pen
in one hand and a slurpee in the
other.
"Going out to lunch is a
big break from school," says
Stephanie Zameck, a senior at
North Farmington High School.
"It can be very relaxing."
Ms. Zameck is one of many
students from the Farmington
School District who leave their
high school each day to eat lunch
elsewhere. The only way they'll
stay inside is if the roads are high
on the white stuff or their wal-
lets are low on the green stuff.
It's not that cafeteria food is so
awful. After all, a bagel is a bagel
is a bagel. But, why settle for an
in-house carbohydrate when

Brueggers Bagel Bakery is across
the street?
These students from Farm-
ington Hills, however, are in the
minority compared to the rest of
their peers. The reason for this
varies but in most cases, accord-
ing to area administrators, cafe-
terias physically can't house all
students for lunch.
When asked how or why the
lunch policies originated, ad-
minstrators like Ellen Posch of
Lahser High School simply say
the policy "has been there for
years."
In the Bloomfield Hills School
District, for example, only 12th-
graders have the right to go out
to lunch. To enforce the rule, the
seniors have a special picture
identification card they must pro-
duce before leaving the building.
"Allowing 12th-graders to go
out to lunch is a way to reward
them," says Andover Assistant
Principal Lou Ruggirello. He
added that because the policy has

been in place for so long with
minimal complaints, this system
will "probably stay the same."
Mr. Ruggirello says that eat-
ing lunch off school grounds is a
privilege. Students claim the
rules to keep underclassmen in
the school cafeterias are there to
keep the school lunchrooms from
losing money.
"I really looked forward to eat-
ing 'real' lunches as a senior,"
says recent Andover graduate Ja-
son Raznick. "But as a freshman,
I did wish I could have gone out."
At West Bloomfield High
School, the rules are only slight-
ly less strict. Juniors are permit-
ted to leave, but only when driven
by a senior. Freshmen and sopho-
mores must remain in school.
That will all change when the
school becomes a closed campus
within the next couple of years
and all students will be required
to stay at school for lunch.
Those regulations are unfair,
says Jodi Manko, a junior at

West Bloomfield. "If the juniors
have a car they should drive," she
says. "And everybody should be
allowed to go out and take a
break." Many West Bloomfield
students agree with Ms. Manko.
As a result, despite sticker IDs
on cars, it's not uncommon for un-
derclassmen to sneak off with se-
niors. If they're caught, they
spend a Saturday in detention.
But, according to Ms. Manko,
who has left campus on numer-
ous occasions, it's a small sacri-
fice. Of course, she's never been
caught.
West Bloomfield senior Justin
Bayer has never taken an un-
derclassman out but he knows a
lot of people who do. "It's really
easy to do and it's not that big of
a deal," says Mr. Bayer, who eats
almost daily at Merlin's Coney
Island, less than a mile from his
school. "Underclassmen should
have the same rights as juniors
and seniors; they shouldn't have
to eat the food there."
Seymour Gretchko, su-
perintendent of West
Bloomfield Public Schools,
is aware of the smuggling.
"I know the system isn't
100 percent fool-proof," he
says.
With all this fast-food
chauffeuring, it's ironic
that safety is one of the
least common concerns
when deciding these poli-
cies. While most parents
think that their kids are in
jeopardy every time they
zip in and out of parking
lots, administrators claim
that there is usually noth-
ing to fear.
"Orchard Lake Road is
a problem for all drivers
any time of the day," says
Mr. Gretchko. "There's ac-
tually minimum traffic at
the time of their lunch."
Dr. Gretchko says the
district prefers the closed-
campus format. The cafe-
teria renovation will allow
West Bloomfield High to
fully implement the policy.
Joan Burleigh, assistant
principal at Groves High

