Andrea Helsel

Some students never learn. Even with all the information students get about campus punishments when they first arrive on campus, even with all the posters around campus reminding them of the consequences of breaking rules, and even with all the students wearing gags walking around campus and standing around being taunted, a few students can never seem to stay out of trouble. Even previous gaggings don't seem to help them learn to follow the rules, so the only thing that can be done is to make their punishments more and more severe.

Andrea had yet to learn that it was important to keep quiet in the library. After the verbal warnings from librarians, one had enough and sentenced her to two weeks in a tape gag her freshman year. She didn't talk loudly in the library for the rest of that year, but by the first month of her sophomore year she was once again sporting tape over her mouth, this time for a whole month. The librarians hoped that would put an end to Andrea's loud mouth, but her junior year she seemed to be even louder than ever.

Clearly, drastic measures had to be taken. Upping her punishment time to three hours, and adding a large, absorbent cloth to her gag, was just one way to take care of that. Making her a regular ficture in the library for those three months was another, as whenever she was awake and not in class or on an appointed meal break, she had to stand in various parts of the library, serving as a living reminder of library rules for all the other students. As the weeks wore on and Andrea endured that huge, confining gag, students and librarians wondered if she'd finally be quiet her senior year. Some students, they reminded one another, never learn.