Class of 2024 By the Numbers: Methodology
The Skyline Post employed various methods, relying especially on sampling and inference to give a quantitative perspective on the Class of 2024’s time at Skyline.
90,000 Stairs Climbed
To calculate the number of stairs climbed by each senior, the Skyline Post first counted the number of individual stairs in each flight, and the number of flights to reach each floor. Every flight of stairs at Skyline consists of 14 stairs, and there are seven flights of stairs from bottom to top. From there, all seniors in the 3rd-period advanced journalism class provided their third-trimester schedules for analysis, serving a cluster sample for all seniors. By counting the number of floors climbed for each of them, and then calculating the number of flights climbed, we estimated that each senior climbed about 164 stairs a day.
We then generated a confidence interval at the 95% level of confidence, yielding an interval of (114, 215), suggesting that the average number of stairs climbed daily was between 114 and 215. Our initial sample mean of 164 was well within that interval, so we multiplied 164 stairs by180 school days, times the three years the seniors have spent in the building, giving a final count of 88,560 stairs climbed. Then accounting for the natural variability in class schedules, Skytime days when an extra class period is added, any potential stairs climbed not during passing time, and rounding for a cleaner answer, we estimated that each senior climbed approximately 90,000 stairs.
1,000 Hours of Online School
To find how long each senior spent learning online, we used a conservative estimate of six hours a day, multiplied by the 180 day long school year, giving an estimate of 1,050 hours of online instruction. We then accounted for the slightly shorter, “asynchronous” learning days and the couple of online days during Winter 2022: we estimated that each senior spent 1,000 hours learning online.
150 Hours in the Student Parking Lot
The Skyline student parking lot swarms with traffic after school every day, with many students waiting in line to leave for 15-20 minutes. Using an estimate for daily waiting time of 17.5 minutes, then multiplying that by 180 days of school, then multiplying by two years as a driver and one year of being picked up (three years total), we found that each senior spent approximately 150 hours in the student parking lot.
10,000 Spicy Chicken Sandwiches Eaten
Spicy chicken sandwiches are an enduring cafeteria favorite; every day the sandwiches sell out within minutes of lunch starting.
To calculate how many sandwiches the Seniors have eaten, we first counted how many are available at lunch. There are about 35-40 sandwiches for each of the two lunch periods, so around 75 sandwiches a day are sold. We then multiplied 75 sandwiches by 180 school days, times 3 years, divided by 4 classes: the senior class likely ate 10,000 spicy chicken sandwiches during their time at Skyline.
18,500 Cookies Eaten
During lunch, students in the Business, Marketing, and Information Technology (BMIT) Magnet run the Sky Store. The Sky Store sells many different products, including Skyline merchandise, drinks, and the students’ favorite, fresh baked cookies.
According to BMIT student and Sky Store employee, Maverick Musser (‘25), the Sky Store sells 150 cookies a day, for all except three weeks of the school year. Michigan school years are made up of 36 weeks, minus three is 33 weeks. Using the daily cookie count, 150 cookies, times 5 days per week, times 33 weeks, times 3 years, divided by 4 classes of students, the seniors ate just over 18,500 cookies.
100,000 Reusable Water Bottles Filled
Skyline’s Student Action Senate, or SAS, collected data for environmental sustainability week with the goal of analyzing the Skyline community’s use of reusable water bottles. SAS used data from the automated trackers on the filling stations on each floor, providing the Skyline Post with a weekly water bottle count of 3,885 reusable bottles filled. We then multiplied this count by the 36 school weeks in a year, times three years, divided by the four classes of Skyline students. Accounting for some of the natural week-to-week variability in bottle filling, this yields a final tally of 100,000 bottles filled by the Class of ‘24.
