It’s 9:30 a.m. and your stomach is rumbling. You didn’t have time to eat breakfast and you have another two hours until lunch. You turn your head to look at the clock for the tenth time and you suddenly hear your teacher munching and slurping away on coffee and a muffin. The sweet aroma of the meal lingers on your nose and you think of that million dollar question once again: Why can’t I eat during class?

The policy at AHS is that no one is supposed to be eating or drinking anything other than water during class. Some teachers follow this policy strictly, and yet many of those same teachers eat while teaching. Biology teacher Surmeen Bedi thinks it is not appropriate for students nor teachers to eat or drink during class unless it is water that is consumed.

“Students should not be allowed to eat, because if one student is eating, everyone is going to bring food,” Bedi said.

Some teachers don’t care as long as the students eating don’t make a mess and are not distracting. We believe that if teachers are eating during class, then we should be able to eat as well.

We asked English teacher Bill Maglisceau if he thinks it’s fair that some teachers eat while teaching but don’t allow their students to eat.

“It’s whatever the teacher chooses to do and it’s his or her choice,” Maglisceau said.

One reason students should be able to have snacks in class is that the students are already eating, whether the teachers allow it or not. This means that certain students will eat their snacks when their teachers aren’t looking or try to hide their snacks in their desks.

Other teachers condone eating in class because they want to eat as well and understand our situation. Science teacher, Rachel Lazar eats during class and doesn’t mind her students eating.

“I don’t mind eating as long as it isn’t a big lunch. I also don’t allow candy,” Lazar said. Right now the policy isn’t being equally enforced.

Many students don’t eat breakfast because they have to rush in the morning to arrive at school on time. This way, students get a greater amount of sleep. Students then have to wait three to five hours until lunch. As such, they have trouble focusing in their morning classes because all they can think about is getting some food in their bellies.

Health teacher Peggy Capehart believes that students and teachers should be able to eat during class depending on the snack and as long as all trash reaches the trash can.  “Students and teachers should be able to eat during the first 5 mins of their first period class.  The snack should be healthy and students should place trash in the trash can.  Its necessary for people to eat breakfast to get through the day, oatmeal, fruit, cereal,  etc…, these things are necessary for a diabetic, students to focus on class work,” said Capeheart.

The lunch block at AHS is only 30 minutes. If you buy lunch, you spend about two-thirds of the period waiting in line. You then want to try and talk with your friends for the remainder of lunch, but you never have time to do both. Thus, you can’t even finish your lunch. As a result, you are still starving, which means you have to finish your lunch secretly in your afternoon classes. Or, your other option is to go back to class feeling so full you want to throw up from stuffing yourself in the last five minutes of lunch.

We asked Bedi, Maglisceou, Capehart and  Lazar what particular foods and drink annoy them. Some of the foods and drink included candy, soda, chocolate, chips and Pop-Tarts. Some teachers were annoyed by these foods and drinks because students often don’t throw away their wrappers. These foods are unhealthy and make a lot of noise. The students eating the food also advertise to other students that they are eating. Furthermore, leftover food can cause bug infestations.

We agree that these are problems for teachers, so we think that students should be more respectful of these issues while still be able to eat in class.

Another question we asked the teachers was how many of their colleagues actually follow the policy. Most said that the majority of the teachers they know don’t follow the policy. We agree with this, although there is still a good amount of teachers who are very strict about eating during class.

In the end, the pros definitely outweigh the cons in our opinion. So, teachers, please let us eat during class so that we can actually focus on your teaching and be more lively and energetic.