Kids can be really creative, and it seems to me that encouraging creativity is a good thing.

What would you do if you worked at a school and the students were so creative with how they got to class that they were often late for class? Would you take away their opportunity to be creative, or would you relax the tardy rules?

In today’s story, a new rule causes students to express their creativity, but when they get too creative it’s taken away. This is a fun ride you won’t want to miss!

Hallways had “lanes” for students to get them to class faster

I was a teacher at a middle school in 2014/2015 that was Title 1 School (extremely low income and test scores).

The state government actually removed all administration staff two years prior, for the whole district, as the student outcomes were so low.

The new admin came in with a micromanagement authoritarian directive to improve test scores.

One of their brightest ideas was to put lanes in the hallways to manage flow and gets students to classes faster.

This sounds like fun!

There were three lanes. Two one ways along the walls, and a middle “teacher only lane.”

Within about three days all the students were driving imaginary cars.

They orderly followed one another, would let people in to merge, used turn signals, and generally was pretty fun for a few days.

The teachers would direct students at intersections and played along for a bit.

But it took longer for students to get to class.

The flow did slow down though as students wouldn’t pass each other and would have trouble merging into traffic around doorways.

Another thing taking time was the students parking their imaginary vehicles outside the classroom. They would spend time backing them into spaces, or have trouble parallel parking.

The admin didn’t like this and really started getting angry at the staff and students as so many kids were still tardy to class. They actively were handing out detentions and pretty angry at staff for playing along.

This really triggered the students to start getting malicious.

These students really got creative!

The students couldn’t cross the middle lane, so they would have to walk down long hallways and make u-turns to see their friends or get to their lockers/classrooms.

They started cruising the long hallways with their tricked out imaginary low riders. They would have shock noises even.

Some of the really popular kids started a bus system where they had a schedule to pickup other students and deliver them to other classes. They would hold shoulders and move as a block.

Sometimes the bus broke down at an intersection and blocked traffic for everyone.

They even created problems with their imaginary cars.

Drag racing started where they held up traffic and raced down the hallways.

Police would pull people over and write tickets.

The most annoying part was students needing to leave the classroom to check on their cars to make sure no one stole it.

Sometimes a student would come back from the bathroom and ask if anyone was driving a type of car as it was being towed.

The disruptions in class started to really get out of control.

Admin didn’t realize how much the students would like the lanes.

Admin thought it was going to be a phase and students would get bored.

The best part about school for the students turned out to be the time in-between classes.

Everyone was tardy constantly.

This wasn’t an improvement.

Eventually the lanes (tape) were ripped up and they shortened the passing period time by 2 mins so students had to rush to class and couldn’t spend any time in the hallways.

The cars slowly died out and the new ‘fad’ was needing to use the restroom during class time because the passing period was like 3 mins long and not enough toilets to satisfy all the students legitimately.

Students were written up for needing to use the bathroom so kids just started clogging toilets and peeing wherever.

Other car things: flat tires, emergency sirens, car accidents, gps problems, no gas, lost license, couldn’t find keys, stole other kids cars, repo cars, towing cars

The idea of lanes sounds like it backfired for the admin, but it sounded awesome for the students! The fact that they enjoyed the imaginary cars so much would make them want to go to school, and that sounds like a huge win and morale boost that shouldn’t have been taken away.

Encouraging students to use their imagination is a good thing.

Let’s see how Reddit reacted to this story.

Admin doesn’t always think through the rules.

This is funny!

I love that the teachers played along too.

I can picture this. It sounds so cute!

This person found the story hilarious!

Another person shares their favorite part of the story.

Children can be so creative when they’re given the freedom to use their imagination.

If you liked that post, check out this story about a guy who was forced to sleep on the couch at his wife’s family’s house, so he went to a hotel instead.