This year, CHS will institute two new policies whereby students may buy their grades and extracurricular activities. Citing severe budget constraints, the school claims that it “simply does not have the funding to continue to educate CHS students.” Accordingly, the school has, after careful consideration, decided that it is best to just let the market provide students with the best grades and extracurriculars they are willing to pay for.

Under the new policies, a student must pay $200 for an A in a class, $150 for a B, $100 for a C, etc. Notably, IB and AP courses will cost students an additional $100 per grade.

Similarly, the up-front cost of being a thespian will be $1000 with an additional $500 for each succeeding year that the student wishes to remain a thespian. Likewise, being a Varsity Baseball player will be $1300 per year. A spot on the Speech and Debate team will cost $2000 per year.

The new policy will allow programs to stop mandating that the students waste their time at bake sales, selling entertainment coupon books, or holding car washes.

“We decided that instead of pretending that the money is a requested donation, we’d just cut the crap and demand the money up front,” Speech and Debate coach David Chamberlain said.

The truth is that the Speech and Debate team simply cannot attend tournaments nor be a part of the league without money, nor can the theater department put on shows, and the Baseball team can ill afford to shell out the $45,000 cost of maintaining the fields and paying their five extra coaches. (Do not ask why Baseball needs five extra coaches.)

CUSD determined it unfair that those who can afford to spend hundreds, even thousands of dollars on preparatory classes for the ACT and SAT, tutors, computers, and all the materials that are strongly recommended (but cannot legally be required of students) in order to succeed in high school. Yet those who cannot afford all of that are comfortingly told that they could be just as successful if only they worked twice as hard.

The new policy aims to increase transparency and will allow everyone to just stop pretending that it is not inherently easier for students from higher income families to succeed at CHS. It also serves to dispel that broadly-held, nagging fiction that public education is free. The student response so far has been positive.

“I’m really excited about this,” senior Alexa Tisopulos said. “It’s my last year at CHS and instead of breaking my back to get the last year of solid grades in for college, I can just get a part time job in the Village for extra cash and really up that GPA. Plus, I’ll finally be able to make the Cross-Country team without all that running… ugh!”

Others have criticized allowing students to buy their high school experience as “unfair” or “biased toward the better off.” However, CUSD defended the policies vigorously, pointing out that they are in obvious agreement with current practices at CHS and that the policies seek only to make clearer and more efficient what is already happening at CHS and what is well-established in every school in America.

Disclaimer: The Yamane Report is written and created by the author and its content does not necessarily reflect the opinions of the Wolfpacket, CUSD, CHS, actual facts or true statements by any person or persons (real or imagined), dogs, cats, fruits, vegetables or politicians of all kinds. (But people, the fact that I have to actually say this, I mean, come on.) Readers are advised to consult a trained professional prior to acting in reliance on any assertion of fact, quotation, implication, split infinitive, dangling modifier or best sushi recommendation contained therein.