379. Why Prank

I say to you, whether you believe in today's holiday or not, Happy April Fool's Day! You might see the photo above and think, "Wowza, that's a lot of balloons!" or you might think, "Oh no, that's a horrible fire hazard!" Either way, you make a fair point. Of course, when the 2025s (Hi, 2025s, if you're reading this.) set up this prank last year, I believe they were thinking something like, "How can we cause the most chaos in the building?" rather than "How can we create a seriously dangerous situation?"

When the latter question and its answer were explained to them, many of them quickly came forward to clean up. Clearly, jokes aren't funny if they cause potentially life-threatening peril. Fortunately, in this case, nobody got hurt.

I'd argue that Senior Prank Day last spring served several useful, important, pedagogical aims:

• Embracing the pivot. When the prank wasn't received as intended, the 2025s got themselves in gear to clean the mess.
• Understanding that even when things don't end up as envisioned or hoped, people can enjoy the time together, both in the creation and during the deconstruction.
• Reminding us that not everyone views the world the same or has the same sense of humor and learning that with humor (and in most other emotions our actions can evoke), it's the impact on the other people that matters more than our own intent.
• Accepting the consequences of our actions gracefully is an important skill, whether we're receiving people's gratitude or their scorn.

On the morning of the prank, as I sat aside handing out tape and scissors, one student (Hi, NB! I hope I'll see you at graduation this year.) asked if he could relocate my entire office to the main hallway. My gut said to tell him no, it seemed like too much effort for no upside.

But, I wasn't the person in charge of the prank. The morning belonged to the kids, so I said yes. At the end of the day, before the kids moved my furniture back, I had some realizations:

• I thoroughly enjoyed hanging out in my office hallway, right next to a basketball hoop that was in constant use and a DJ board blasting tunes. I was able to get a lot of work done and feel the positive energy around me.
• When they moved the furniture, I found a few small items that had fallen into hidden spaces and was grateful for the relocation help.
• All year, I'd been low-key annoyed that my rug was slightly bunched under the corner of my desk. When the office was empty, I could easily move the carpet to where I wanted it.
• My office came back to a cleaner, better-looking version of itself.

I ended the day grateful for the chance to work with a different perspective and re-enter my own space with more gratitude for its glow-up.

To be totally clear, I'm not advocating for dangerous pranks; I'm saying that there are benefits to be had from shaking things up and learning from both the process and others' reactions. Of course, when it's time for the 2027s to pull a Senior Prank, I hope they'll find something to do that makes everyone look at the world with delight rather than scorn. (And to any 2027s reading this, I have some ideas brewing.)

If you want to talk about senior pranks over the years that I have thoroughly enjoyed, I'd be happy to reminisce about all of them: everything from live animals to real estate scams.

What do you think? Please share your responses in the comments.

If you're still reading and want to see more photos of the total chaos caused, look below. Note that I didn't take many of these photos. People shared them with me afterwards. I'm not advocating any of the particular aspects of this prank, merely documenting the chaos to give you a sense of what went on.