Senior year is what many high school students look forward to. It is a time when many think they can kick back and coast through the year, because all of their work was taken care of when they were freshmen, sophomores, and juniors. It is a time for fun, friends, nostalgia, and growing up.

It is also a time for senior pranks.

Senior pranks have become as much an American pastime as baseball, Memorial Day cookouts, and Fourth of July fireworks. Just about every high school in the nation has a senior class that has attempted, with or without success, to hold a senior prank. Some say that senior pranks are fun and a way for the graduating class to leave the school with a great memory. Yet, others say that they are juvenile and that the participants deserve maximum punishment. In the end, senior pranks are supposed to be fun for all the students in the school. The question is, when does a prank go too far?

Let’s take a trip down memory lane and revisit the past North Point senior prank attempts:

• The Class of 2009 started a food fight and a water balloon fight in their last days.

• The Class of 2010 began a water balloon fight that started inside the school, and continued on in the bus parking lot. They also attempted a hall freeze, which was unsuccessful, and hid a few egg timers in the school to go off at a synchronized time, which was also unsuccessful.

• The Class of 2011 threw money over the balcony in the main hallway, while someone put a lobster in a toilet.

With the exception of the inside water balloon fight, the “pranks” listed above pale in comparison to those that have become legendary online. These pranks either left no visible mess afterward or one that wasn’t hard to clean up. None of these pranks leave a lasting impression with the exception of the water balloon fight, which was becoming somewhat of a tradition that the Class of 2011 did not keep up.

Are these pranks too much? My answer is no. None of these pranks resulted in the arrest of someone, harmed any person or animals, left any damage that was costly to fix, or involved stealing something (such as a teacher’s car). None of these pranks were intended to ruin the school or its reputation, but were instead just an attempt at having some fun by our departing seniors.

When these pranks begin to distract us from learning, there should be a cause for concern. When people start committing crimes to pull these pranks off, there should be some added mediation by the authorities. Good senior pranks are those that will leave a lasting memory without hurting people, animals, or property in the process. Anything that can’t meet those guidelines ought not to be done at all.