Eightscore and zero years ago, the Noble and Greenough School was founded by the late great George Washington Copp Noble. The soil upon which we stand today was metaphorically fertilized by the dreams of Copp Noble all those years ago. Though, of course, as everybody knows, we did move campuses, so it’s actually a different soil, and we cannot under any circumstances have any historical inaccuracies when we plan to revolt against the school. But I’m getting ahead of myself. These dreams, dreamt up long ago, were dreamed to educate and uplift the next generation of students. And as we all know, he would go on to do just that. For the next 160 years, he and his spirit would continue working his students until they’d pass out from exhaustion, making sure every last page of their Biology textbook would be ingrained into each crevice of their brain. And he’d make us do this, for free. Copp Noble gets to work us, and work us hard, and we don’t even get a salary. We. Don’t. Even. Get. Paid. 

Now tell me, my sweet little reader, does that sound just? Is it fair that we spend so much time each and every day wearing down the skin on our fingers from typing and writing? Let me tell you. No, it isn’t. And, as we all know, there’s nothing else to school. Socializing and being educated are just bonuses. What I’m hearing is that school is work, and work makes money. Therefore, I expect my pockets to be green within the next three weeks. I’m running out of chittable funds, and I’d really like to keep buying my Chicken Parm Sandwiches.

In our current situation, the only reasonable course of action our student body can take is a strike. If we truly want to have our demands met and start getting paid, this is the only way outside of starting a civil war. Therefore, the following is our foolproof plan for the strike that will bring about a new great era for the school. 

This strike will be one for the books, I tell you, and this strike will hopefully commence sometime soon. I’m not really sure when. I have a big history essay coming up, so I’d like to get that done first. However! Once that’s settled, our strike will begin. So when we get around to it, our first move will be for every student to gather in front of the “Noble and Greenough” sign at the entrance of the school. Feel free to bring your pickets, but make sure that the font size is so unbelievably small that anyone passing by won’t have the time or the perfect 20/20 vision necessary to read them. That’ll show ’em. 

We’ll gather on April 15, 2026, during M-block. If you need to attend orchestra or a lesson, let me know, and we can reschedule. At 9:35 a.m. on that fateful day, we will show the school what we’re made of; we’ll show them how badly we want our salary. For that hour and five minutes before the next period, we will be united as one — invincible and ready to take on the world of pain when we get a scolding at Tuesday’s assembly. Some of us may be suspended, expelled, or killed, but that is a sacrifice I’m willing to make. Tuesday’s assembly will be nothing more than a test of our unwavering resolve. For the entire duration of our scolding, it is critical that we plug our ears. I don’t like listening when the school gets mad at me, it makes me cry. Ergo, if I debilitate my auricular senses, my mental fortress will be impregnable. Leaving that room, we will be reformed, rebirthed as new people, ready to never strike again. 

My mom would get really mad if I got expelled. But, this would not mean the death of our dream of a salary. Oh no, far from it. Desperate times will call for desperate measures, and we will have to initiate Phase Two of our plan. I will personally go to Dr. Hall’s office and beg on my hands and knees. I don’t care what it takes, I will put my dignity on the line if it means I can keep getting my Chicken Parms. I’m not doing this for myself, or the sake of our school — I’m fulfilling our dream for the sake of the generations to come, just like Copp Noble did all those years ago. Tears will fall in that office space. I may pout, and I may yell. But never has this strategy faltered for me. When an average human being witnesses a grown 18-year-old man on the ground, clutching his sweater and covered in his own tears, what else can they do but submit? And this, my friends, concludes our framework for how we will get our salary. It’s flawless, perfect, and guaranteed to produce results.