Student story: Hall monitors, room by room

By Bailey Buer

Knock. Knock. Knock.

317. Call your parents and TV off.

316. “Nut uh. Boys out. You’re not sneaky. You’re too big to be sneaky.” The high school boys emerged from the bathroom and scurried down the hall, their shoes flipping and flopping. Sharneé Hudgins saw them run in there more than an hour before. But it’s after 11 p.m. Boys and girls at the Flint Hills Publication Workshop have to be in their own rooms.

318. Timid girls with an organized room answered the doors. Names were stated. Attendance was checked in an efficient manner. No problems here.

315. The door creaks open. “Hi,” the resident said with a cheery smile. “Wait, are you guys taking pictures of us?” At journalism camp someone is always watching.

313. No answer. Knock. Knock. Oops, Wrong door. Girls must remain quiet so people like these residents are not disturbed.

312. “Oh there is just a whole group of people,” said giggling girls eating licorice and jumping around to get a better view of the visitors. “We’re in a picture, like a photograph.”

310. Laughter fills the room. “Thanks for the pics guys,” one girl said sarcastically. “I have no make up please don’t,” her roommate screeched as she emerged from the bathroom. “There is a towel on my head.”

302. Girls worked diligently in their own corners. The lights in the room were already out though that deadline was 30 minutes away.

318. A roommate was missing in action, still conducting an interview down the hall.

Pretty routine tasks for the hall monitors shift that began at 11 p.m. Tuesday on the third floor of the Holiday Inn that workshop students are calling home this week. Student advisers Hannah Blick, Rachel Urban and Hudgins set up camp in the middle of the hall equipped with laptops, snacks and comfortable outfits to endure the night ahead.

“Our job is to keep people quiet, not to be anal,” Blick said. “There are other people from the hotel here. We don’t want to make them mad so we don’t get kicked out next year.”

Hudgins was the main watchdog. Her Batman comic strip shorts that fell just below the knee and her ninja turtle shirt and bag displayed her no nonsense efficient attitude. All hall mothers took their job seriously but none had the power-hungry feel.

The camp mother, Robin O’Connell-Tatum, ensured everyone remained on task.

“Nobody has been punched,” O’Connell-Tatum said. “Nobody got drunk. I think we have a good group of kids.”

Chatter and laughter echoed from a room a few doors down. A camper emerged to get ice.

“You can’t get ice,” Hudgins joked. “We’re not going to be that type of hall monitor.”

Camp dad Tyrone Tatum came to check up on the watchers.

“We got 10 kids missing,” Hudgins said.

“You’re joking,” he said.

“I’d probably be like, ‘Mom you need to get over here right now and do your mom thing,’” Hudgins said.

The missing interviewer hurried back to her room. Girls laughed. Footsteps pounded on the floor above. The ice machine hummed and deposited its contents. More noise.
Hannah lurked down the hall. Perking her ears to ensure she knew the right room. The girls were silenced with a polite reminder.

Inside the rooms and out one common thing was keeping everyone awake that night – girl talk. The monitors discussed the Rock Band competition, traveling, college, TV shows, embarrassing stories and jobs. They even ate cheesecake wrapped in picnic checkered covers and pizza from a fellow adviser.

Linda Puntney joined and reminded them to also keep quite. Then she shared her experiences from past camp years. This included pierced tongues, toga parties and attempted escapes to Aggieville.

“One year I couldn’t get someone to answer the door,” Puntney said. “I pounded on the room and said ‘Open up. I’m Linda Puntney, the workshop director.’ I barged in on a woman and this huge military guy who was not part of this camp and his wife who came to visit him.”

She chuckled.

“I’m Linda Puntney the workshop director.”

This night was not as dramatic. Blick, Hudgins and Urban returned to their abodes soon after 1 a.m. Their job was done. Only silence rang through the halls.

Bailey Buer is a senior at Kapaun Mt. Carmel High School and a student in the advanced writing class at the Flint Hills Publications Workshop.