Picture this: You slide out from underneath your sheets, get that morning stretch in while accompanied by that overdramatic but necessary yawn. You bathe in sunlight shining from the window. You make your bed, head over to the shower, turn on your favorite Drake song and just lose yourself. After that, you put on the outfit you’re feeling for the day, put on your bag, and then…Oh My Gosh! I have to walk to the Jack?!

Throughout my years at Berkshire, there have been many shifts, from having to Covid test all the time to not having to, the day we have our fall concert does not fall on the same date anymore, the location of the music center has changed, and now, we don’t even eat our food in the same place. Having to navigate this new environment has proven quite a struggle. The purpose of this essay is to help fix an ongoing issue we are experiencing as a school. Now, the school has tried many ways to help ease the student body back into a routine, in the form of permitting scooters. The scooter epidemic on campus has been a popular one! The advent of scooters has honestly revolutionized our daily routines, making the huge campus feel smaller, and turning it into a more navigable space. But, with new environments, come new responsibilities and challenges, constituting new dilemmas. Our dilemma is theft. While we cannot eradicate theft from the whole world, we can definitely try to work on minimizing its effects on our community. 

Here comes the solution… Berkshire-branded scooters! Now, I know you may be reading this like, “Michkael, how and why would we do that?” Just listen. A huge fleet of scooters that represent our school’s colors that would be available for all students to use. Look, I am not proposing to take away scooters, just add. I feel that if we were to add some school scooters, we would limit the “need” to steal scooters. This could hopefully mitigate the need to “borrow” someone else’s scooter without permission.

 We could also add some new racks, but not just any racks, metal ones! They would be strong and become the key to maintaining an organized “scooter garage.” These unsung heroes would be reliable, prevent chaos, and reduce the opportunity for stealing. 

However, the thing that would tie this together: a GPS location for these scooters. If we were to apply some sort of technological chip into these school-issued scooters, we would bring down the theft rates. And even thinking a step further, we could work with the tech office on creating an app to see which scooters are in use and which aren’t! 

For the school administrators reading this and shaking their heads, just give me a bit more time before you write this off! Cities have implemented this idea all over the country using both scooters and bikes, so we would have reference points with this new project. Since we are in a more “experimental” phase of Berkshire in the absence of Benson, this would be the best time to test it out! We could do a system where they are timed, so maybe someone “rents” it out for an hour or so, after that hour the scooter would lock up, preventing the student from using it. Also, to make this really school-inclusive, we could utilize school credit or even the points system. Using the points system by allowing the students with fewer points, more time to ride. Say for example, a teacher sees a scooter in a place where it should not be. They could scan it and see which student it was rented out to at what time, and then proceed with the necessary repercussions. This would create a better atmosphere within the student body because students want to ride the scooters, so this would foster a better sense of responsibility within the community. 

This idea of school-issued scooters, reinforced metal racks, and even a potential tracking system could serve as a huge shield against this scooter theft predicament. The goal is not just putting an end to this ridiculousness but it is also about fostering a sense of community and safety within our Berkshire family. Let’s get these wheels rolling, not just with the scooters but on these ideas to make Berkshire better!