As of the 2025-26 school year, Foothill Technology High School provides lockers solely for the students enrolled in on-campus physical education. Foothill Tech is a magnet school with a lottery system for acceptance and has a relatively smaller campus size compared to the surrounding high schools in the Ventura Unified School District. As a small high school, Foothill Tech lacks enough space to accommodate lockers. As a result, it is necessary for students to carry all their items with them in backpacks or bags.

The lockers available to students enrolled in on-campus P.E. are located in the Black Box, Foothill Tech’s P.E. room. They are used to store athletic gear, but there are no lockers available for students who are not enrolled in P.E. on Foothill Tech’s campus who participate in athletics, Independent Study Physical Education (ISPE), or have already fulfilled their P.E. requirements. It is neither necessary nor beneficial for students if lockers were to be installed at Foothill Tech, not only because of the campus size, but also because they are not the optimal way to store supplies.

Students like Charles Young ‘29 view lockers as more inconvenient than backpacks, because a student’s locker may not always be close to their classroom, while backpacks and their contents are right next to the students.

“Cons [about lockers] could be forgetting to grab [items] if you need them,” Young said.

Students have busy agendas on top of their academic schedules, extracurriculars and responsibilities, which can make it difficult to have the necessary school supplies when needed. Backpacks and other bags provide immediate access to these items, which might have been on the other end of campus with lockers installed.

Some students state the benefits that lockers could bring to Foothill Tech; Natalia Gonzalez ‘28 is one of them. Those benefits would include a place to store schoolwork; however, students who view the advantages of lockers also realize the negative effects.

“I think it’d be nice to at least put some stuff in lockers. That way we don’t have to carry it all … Cons could be [that] our stuff could possibly get stolen, it could be unsafe sometimes,” Gonzalez said.

While lockers provide space to store students’ heavy loads, there is still the risk of personal belongings being taken from these compartments.

Lockers are not a guaranteed secure place for schoolwork and personal belongings. Even though they have locks, they are not foolproof. Not only can these compartments fail to secure the contents, but many students like Christine Allen ‘28 also do not view lockers as essential.

“I don’t mind not having lockers, because I don’t think it’s too big of a deal that we carry around our backpack,” Allen said.

Many students do not view it as critical for Foothill Tech to install lockers, not only because of the inconveniences they cause, but also because they are not useful for everyone. They do not give students immediate access to needed items, and theft may occur, with students like Allen recognizing the disadvantages of lockers and realizing that they are neither crucial nor useful. Lockers should not be installed for every student at Foothill Tech because they are less convenient than bags, and many students would not benefit from them. Lockers should continue to be provided solely for those enrolled in on-campus P.E., as Foothill Tech’s small campus does not have the space to locate lockers for all attending students.