In a school with 2,483 students, there is a surplus of opinions floating around at Naperville North High School. In NNHS’s very own Advanced Media Lab, student opinions were brought together to discuss key features of North. Those viewpoints have been narrowed down to a consensus on the various aspects students love, loathe and simply have to live with at North.
Love it: Our school’s culture of flexibility and freedom
At Naperville North High School, students benefit from a culture that values both academic success and personal freedom. This is especially evident in two aspects of student life: off-campus privileges and the rich variety and availability of extracurricular activities.
Students truly appreciate the opportunity to take blended classes, an early dismissal or late arrival, as well as the opportunity for off-campus lunches. These options reflect a high level of trust between students and administration, allowing students more autonomy over their schedules and personal lives during school hours. Not only do these off-campus privileges break up the typical school day, but they also provide a sense of independence that students find motivating. The ability to take a breather from the campus environment can enhance focus and productivity when students return to class, making these freedoms both practical and empowering.
Another key aspect that Naperville North students love is the variety and flexibility within extracurricular activities. The school’s approach to clubs allows for a culture where students don’t feel pressured to give up one interest in favor of another. Although students may be forced to commit to a singular sport per season, many students participate in multiple clubs without feeling overwhelmed. Even though the students are expected to perform at a high level within all the activities they engage in, working with sponsors and coaches allows them to take part in extracurriculars they are passionate about. This flexibility encourages students to explore their interests freely, building a sense of community and belonging.
Loathe it: Parking traffic and poor transportation
While NNHS students do appreciate many aspects of the school, there are a couple of issues that they consistently abhor, the biggest stressor stressors relating to busing and parking.
Although the school's busing system is typically consistent for most students, the timing of arrival and departure for these buses is not. Every student who is in the busing range is offered information on Infinite Campus about their bus. Among this information, the website includes bus numbers and the specific times buses are supposed to arrive at in the morning. Even with this aid, students who take buses in the morning find themselves having to adapt to buses not adhering to their schedules. A bus arriving at their stop five to ten minutes early may not seem like a drastic issue, but most buses that arrive early also inherently depart early. For students who walk a block or two to get to their bus, this slight time shift can cause them to miss their buses entirely, leaving them stranded with likely no other form of transportation to school.
Another issue with bus timing is the hour in which they arrive at school. Many students are picked up by their bus by 6:30-6:45 am and arrive at school before 7 am. This means that students taking the bus are sitting in the small cafeteria or another communal space for an hour before school starts, left with nothing to do. Not only is boredom a problem, but these students are sacrificing the time needed for extra sleep. High school students, who are notorious for their poor sleep schedules, need any extra minute of sleep that can be spared. Forcing students who take the bus to wake up an hour earlier than their car-riding counterparts seems unbeneficial, especially when the students spend the hour sitting pointlessly or wandering aimlessly around the school.
Arrival and departure aren’t just a pain for students who take the bus. Students who drive their cars also find themselves arriving at North at unreasonably early times to claim a parking spot that is within walking distance to the actual building. For those students, as well as seniors who may have parking passes and therefore do not have to wake up extra early to find a spot, the traffic around NNHS and in the parking lots is a hazard in itself. Students who find themselves stuck in traffic may be less conscious of driving safely, and more worried about making it to class on time. Not only does the issues surrounding parking at North increase the risk of driving accidents, but it also is a huge factor in tardies during first period. The traffic on Mill Street and Ogden Avenue creates a bottleneck as students attempt to turn into North's various parking lots. This jam serves as one of the reasons that students can’t efficiently get in and out of the school.
Live with it: Finicky air conditioning and internet connection
Between the things NNHS students absolutely love and utterly loathe, there are also those few inconveniences that everyone has learned to live with, even if they occasionally cause a bit of frustration. Chief among these inconveniences are the inconsistent heating and air conditioning throughout the school along with the unreliable Wi-Fi and restrictive internet filters on school devices.
Anyone walking through the halls on a typical school day will notice the temperature differences from one room to the next. Some classrooms feel like a sauna, with the heat cranked up even on mild days, while others are chilly enough to warrant wearing jackets indoors. It’s unpredictable enough that many students have learned to layer up, adapting to the temperature swings that have become part of their daily routine. Sure, it’s inconvenient to go from a too-warm classroom to a shockingly cold hallway, but it’s something everyone just deals with as a quirky part of our school atmosphere.
The school’s Wi-Fi and the internet restrictions on Chromebooks are another persistent annoyance. The Wi-Fi often struggles to keep up with North's heavy student demand, leading to slow connections and frequent disconnects. When it does work, strict filters can make it hard for students to access even basic resources, often blocking sites that could help with research or assignments. While students are often frustrated by having to work around these limitations, they’ve learned to accept it and find alternative ways to get what they need. Whether it’s by looking things up on their phones or by working with limited access on school devices, they’ve found ways around these conundrums.
These small issues, irregular temperature control and limited internet access are far from ideal, but they’ve become an accepted part of life at Naperville North. Students might grumble about them, but in the end, they’re just minor irritations in an otherwise positive high school experience.
Whether it’s things we love, things we loathe, or things we just find a way to live with, NNHS students each have a fountain of thoughts and opinions that can help improve the high school experience. Here at Naperville North, we are happy to say that our school offers a variety of beneficial experiences to our students, but we are even happier to acknowledge our power as a student body to share opinions that will shape those experiences in ways that best support our community.
Photos by Jaél Sarai Badie, Bridget Ogan and Sydney Queen