In October, terrified students watched as the high school hill went up in smoke. Photo courtesy of sophomore Talia Garrett.

  Students at San Luis Obispo High School will have a hard time forgetting what happened on October 30, 2023. The hill behind the school went ablaze after students were smoking illegal substances. The hill then caught on fire again earlier this year in August, east of where it burned before. 

  The October fire began during the school day, causing the classrooms to be evacuated. A rare occasion where a drill like the one we had yesterday actually came in handy! Or did it…

  “[The fire drills helped] because we sometimes did fire drills where we had to go down onto the field which is what we had to do for the actual fire last year. I would say they don’t really prepare you for how chaotic it really was… the drills are a lot easier because everyone knows what’s going on and where they’re going,” said junior Ruby Ancheta-Johnson.

  If you’re a freshman you most likely remember the monthly chaos that were Laguna fire drills. They occurred around every month and each time the students were forced into them nothing went right. From kids ditching their class, to bratty boys screaming, all students dreaded those days. 

   “[Fire drills] are important but they make them too long just standing outside. It’s really unnecessary to be quiet; there is no point in being quiet in a fire drill… in my opinion we should take our backpacks. There might be important things in it and some people maybe can’t afford to buy a new backpack or anything to replace it with,” said freshman Loujayn Chafroud. 

  The big question is, “are they worth the time, chaos, and lost hours of class time?” 

 According to California state law High Schools must conduct fire safety drills at least two times a school year. 

  “Because of construction and sensor problems we had at least 15 other fire drills [throughout the year]. It was really difficult, you’d have one class where one class would be taken for a fire drill…we had them during finals…it got to be a real problem,” said English teacher Scott Nairne.

  While the drills here do serve a purpose it seems the school needs to work on their alarm system as well as a way to spread awareness in the event of a fire so it’s less chaotic. 

  Maybe it’s not worth it to burn these drills down quite yet. 

Sources: securitymagazine.com, codes.findlaw.com, statepolicies.nasbe.org