Those rules that nobody ever describes but everybody always knows — every society has them, and Chamblee Charter High School is no different. Several laws govern the social lives of students, from yearbook pictures to lunchtime seating.

A tradition on picture day is that the juniors all dress up in relation to a theme. Last year, the sophomores thought about doing a theme of their own. Current junior, but then sophomore, Sarah Williams fought hard against it in her class’s Facebook group.

“At Chamblee, that’s just a thing that juniors do,” said Williams. “It’s never been a thing that sophomores do.”

Junior Hamida Tanha was one of the advocates for her sophomore class doing a theme for picture day.

“Having a theme as a sophomore kind of felt like a rebellion to me,” said Tanha. “There is a certain hierarchy people follow regarding grade levels and I felt that if we had actually pulled it off it would have been pretty impressive.”

Senior Jaqueline Jordan would not have cared very much if the sophomores had done a theme for their yearbook photos when she was a junior.

“As long as they [the sophomores] don’t do the same thing as the juniors, then I don’t really have a problem with it,” said Jordan.

Junior Ivy-Catherine Rogers had a similar opinion.

“If I’m being honest, I probably wouldn’t have cared this year, but as a sophomore if I had seen sophomores or freshmen doing a theme, I would have been like ‘Come on guys, that’s a junior thing.’”

Tanha and Williams, however, would not have been big fans.

“I would have been mad,” said Williams. “Like, genuinely upset.”

Tanha would have been slightly impressed by a successful sophomore theme, but that is it.

“The freshmen would be a different story,” said Tanha. “I don’t think that they can pull off something like that in their first year.”

Another hierarchal tradition moves away from photography and towards football games.

The student section at home football games is often packed with students cheering on Chamblee’s team in a display of school spirit and camaraderie. The arrangement of students within the section, however, isn’t as unified.

“They’re always chanting ‘Move back freshmen!’,” said sophomore Solange Jackson, regarding the upperclassmen. “Only the seniors can stand in the front.”

The purpose for this chant, however, is less about separation and more about the limited space available in the student section.

“Everyone down front gets really clustered and that’s when people fall and get trampled and that’s really dangerous, so the freshmen need to move back,” said senior Bart Turney.

One more thing that separates people by grade is the sidewalk cafe. Only seniors are supposed to sit outside during lunch.

“It’s a special privilege,” said senior Emma Axelson. “It’s something you look forward to.”

Some juniors, however, could not wait. In A lunch, a table of eleventh graders has been eating outside all school year.

“It’s not as loud and crowded as inside,” said Theo Hardy, one of the group.

His friend, Rohan Misra, agreed.

“There are too many freshmen in there [the cafeteria],” said Misra.

Both boys think their seating is justified, “as long as the seniors are okay with it.” Misra got permission from senior Marshall Peters.

“It bothered me at first,” said Peters, “but as long as I like them [the juniors] […] and it’s a good atmosphere, I don’t care.”

Axelson disagreed.

“They need to be yelled at — or gently but firmly corrected,” said Axelson. “We waited, so they have to wait.”