PBIS lessons aim to decongest the landing

Everyone familiar with the horrors of the landing. One of the most dreaded places at Westside, the crowded, loud, and slow-moving landing is avoided by many students.

“[The landing] is exactly what I expected it would be. It is okay but it is crowded all the time and it is annoying,”  freshman Logan Wilson said.

The main issue is that students stand around and talk while everyone else trying to get to their classes. This build up continues until there is no room to walk.

“Part of the problem is that it is called the landing. When birds land on something, they sit there ” dean Kimberly DeLaCruz said.

Students stand it circles and everyone has to squeeze around them which causes traffic to build up.

“Sometimes it can be almost impossible to get through the landing. “I have to shove my way through,” Wilson said.

There are so many students going in the different directions at one time.

“Students are trying to get from point A to point B, but someone else’s point B might be someone else’s point A, and especially trying to get to one set of stairs [from] another set of stairs, while students are trying to get into room 220, really creates the traffic,” junior Shay Snow said.

While the landing is congested and noisy, it also has its perks.

“I like how is the most central point in the school and you can get pretty much anywhere from it,” Snow said.

The landing doesn’t need immediate fix, but the Westside staff has been working on small ways to improve it.

“[The improvements] should come through with the lessons we are teaching in homeroom on Tuesdays,” DeLaCruz said. “One of those lessons will be on the landing. Once that becomes clear to people, especially freshman who have never been here and can only learn by what they see, then that will help.”

Pros and cons aside, walking through the landing is a part of the experience of being a student at Westside and it isn’t going away. The problems associated with the landing will only improve if we work together to make it move more smoothly and don’t stop and stand in the middle.