Ever since I entered Middle School,  I saw other students always making use of the library for resting on the poofs after long nights full of studying and working. Everyday I saw students using the library’s “poof zone” as place were they could sleep during lunch or any other time they had free. It was almost a culture; when a student stayed up all night working and came to school extremely tired, that student knew that his path towards survival was taking a short nap during window or lunch at the library. However, the librarians have recently been kicking sleepers out of the library, upsetting many.

 The librarians claim that the library’s policy is that nobody can sleep in the library. Most recently, they have been threatening with giving faltas to those who continue to sleep in the library. However, this policy is not coherent and contradicts the previous culture that students had established and followed for many years with no opposition from any random “library policy”.

When I say that the policy is not coherent, it is because students can not possibly be expected to all of a sudden change a culture that has been going on for years, especially if they keep being encouraged to continue to doing what they are doing. The librarians demand that students stop using the library as a place to take short naps. However, they keep half a dozen puffs spread throughout a carpet on an isolated corner inside the library. It is as if they were trying to encourage the students to grab a poof and sleep. If you want students to stop sleeping there, then why would you save an entire section of the library just to put a carpet full of poofs? Puffs are made for sleeping. That is the whole idea behind a poof; It is supposed to be a comfortable chair were you can sleep.  “Ultimate Sack”, a webpage which sells poofs, sells them as great items for relaxing. “ You can take bean bag chairs [poofs]  to the beach, the park or even camping. What a great way to relax!¨ This is a clear evidence that people usually think of poofs as something they can sleep/relax on. For this reason, it is logical to assume that when a students sees a poof, he would try to go and sleep on it.

 The counter argument the librarians give is that students are allowed to relax in those poof, but are not allowed to sleep. Lina Isaaza, libarian for the HS library said “We encourage students to use the poofs as a way to relax and enjoy the library, but it looks wrong for people to come in here and sleep.” However, as Davide Sangiongvanny, junior student said “There is really no difference between sleeping and simply relaxing. It is the same thing. If relaxing is allowed, then sleeping should be. Besides, you can barely tell the difference between someone sleeping and someone relaxing.”.

 The main point I want to get across is that if sleeping is allowed, then the poofs shouldn’t be there and if poofs are going to be there, then sleeping should be allowed ( and  be seen as if one was simply relaxing).

 “ I personally do believe that by having so many poofs in the libary, we are in a way encouraging students to sleep because most people who lay down on a poof will eventually fill sleepy and most likely use the poof for sleeping if they are tired. I believe that in order for us to be consistent with our policy, at least most poofs should be removed. That way it would be more fair with students and the policy would be coherent,” said Lina.