An almost mythical document, designed merely to torment the students and to provide a handy get out of jail free card for all teachers due to the simple fact that they don't exist. Please take the time to observe the following story, cleaned up and shortened in places. It is all true, and by true, I DO, IN FACT, MEAN true.
"Put that chewing gum in the bin!"
Why? I thought. Why can't we chew gum in class? Is it dangerous? No. Is it illegal? No. So what is it? Is there a rule that says we can't chew it? It there one that says teachers can?
"Can we have a copy of the school rules, please?" we said to the receptionist.
"I'll just have a look," she says. We wait. "Sorry, we don't have them." she says, "Perhaps you could go to the Head's Office." she suggests.
"Hello. Do you have to school rules?" we say to her.
She says that she doesn't, and that we should try the Year Office.
So we go off, walk half way across the school to the Year Office and speak to them.
"Can we have a copy of the school rules, please?" we say to Mrs B (name changed to avoid suspicion).
"Why? What's the problem?"
"No problem. We just want to look at them." we reasoned.
Mrs B did however insist holding a five minute conversation telling us exactly why there was something wrong. In the end, we convinced her that there was no problem, and she said she didn't have a copy. So she sent us to the School's Main Office.
"Mrs B has sent us to you again. She says you do have a copy."
Main receptionist rifles through her drawer and pulls out a fat folder full of interesting stuff. She leafs through and we see a piece of paper headed "Staff behaviour Policy". We instantly knew that was what we wanted to see. She is just about to give it to us, when the phone rings. Mrs B had phoned the receptionist from the Year Office and told her not to give us the Staff Behaviour Policy. Mrs B tells the receptionist to send us back to her.
Back at the office, Mrs B accuses us of coming back again without her asking. She doesn't know we heard the phone call. Lie #1. She says that if we really want the rules, we come back tommorow.
We go to the Year Office to speak to Mrs B, just like she told us to. She seems annoyed that we came back. Half Lie.
She tells us to speak to Mrs M (name also changed), who is sitting right next to her. Mrs M gets us into a conversation about why there must be a problem, as if she had simply not heard what Mrs B had been talking about, despite being seated right next to her. Mrs B juts in and asks what our names are. She tells us we can buy a copy of the rules for around £2 and that the book is about an inch thick. She tells us to go and see Mrs C (names etc.), who would be in the Careers Library.
We go into the Careers Library. It is completely empty. Mrs C is absolutely definitely not in there. We decide to ask where she is at the Main Office.
"Do you know where we could find Mrs C, please" we ask the receptionist. She tells us that Mrs C is in the Year 11 Office, because they have been short of staff all week. We go to the Year 11 Office, and she is there.
At this point we ask: If Mrs C was in the Year 11 Office, and had been in there all week, why did Mrs B not know?
"Hello. Can we have a copy of th....."
"School Rules?" she interrupts. How did she know? Obvious - Mrs B had phoned her and told her exactly what to not give us. So why did Mrs B send us to the Careers Library when she knew for a fact that Mrs C wasn't there? Lie #2.
Mrs C seems co-operative and tells us to come back on Friday and she will get them for us. She also tells us that they are only a thin booklet, contradicting Mrs B. Lie #3.
Friday then? Not soon enough. We want them now. We arrange to see the Headteacher after school. By enourmous luck/catastrophe, Mrs C is in the Head's Office discussing exactly what to give us when she gives us the rules. She turns us away.
Well, we got the rules. BUT! They were just a hurriedly typed rush job of basic requirements that were already outlined to us at the beginning of term. And it had 5 pages missing (page 2 skipped strangely to page 8), and was stapled together tackily. THEY WERE ALL LYING - THERE WERE NO RULES.
A more interesting and probably vastly more correct (although the above still presides over anything else, in any conceivable situation), is that any interest in the way things work shows self awareness and therefore makes you a troublemaker, who then has to be tracked down, caught, imprisoned, and, if possible, shot so many times that their liquid remains start to evaporate from the heat of the oncoming projectiles.
This was published several months ago, at twenty-one past one (And if you get that reference, you DESERVE to know the secret.). This was the start of our realisation that the school was just one big corrupt, fat, money making (or frittering, as the case may be) corporate devil.
Recently (more recently than the above, anyway), we were stopped in the science corridor and asked why we were going that way. The conversation went something like this, and by something, I mean exactly:
Dinner Lady: Where are you going?
Approaching Teacher: Yes, where have you come from?
Us: That way [pointing behind her]
Teacher [confused]: Well you shouldn't be going down here. You know it's against the school rules to go down the science corridor.
Us: Oh right. Is it against the school rules to chew gum?
Teacher and Dinner Lady [slightly more confused]: Erm.. yes.
Us: Oh right. Is it against the school rules to wear brown shoes?
Teacher: Right. [to rest of party] Off you go. [to remaining person, who was the jipster] You! Come with me!
We walk behind the door. Mild teacher beats follow, but have no effect other than to make me write this.