A memorable ‘birthday’

“This was the best prank I ever pulled,” said veteran science teacher Kellyann Nicholson, as she looked wistfully at a photo on the wall above her office of fellow science teachers Lisa Cochrum and Kristen Thomson in shiny skirts. Above that photo hangs a large, shiny, blue number 50.

In 2000, Nicholson was the judge for a competition in which Cochrum and Thomson were vying to see who could wear a dress to school for the most consecutive days.  

Feeling that the competition was a bit boring, Nicholson decided to work with former principal Kevin Skelly to pull a prank on the pair.

“I wrote a big fancy letter about how [the competition] needed to ‘cease and desist,’ and I used all sorts of fancy words in it,” Nicholson said. “I wrote that it was ‘exclusionary and it made people uncomfortable,’ and I went down to the office and made Mr. Skelly sign it.”

When Cochrum and Thomson received the letter, they thought it was real and went down to the office to try to straighten the situation out. They soon realized that the letter was a prank and vowed revenge.  They latched onto a plan to hold a “50th birthday party” for Nicholson.

“Back in your 30s you didn’t want people to think you were old,” Nicholson said. “They decorated my room even though it wasn’t my birthday and they wore these god awful dresses for me.”

For the next week, all of Nicholson’s students thought she was 50 years old.

“They got me back good,” Nicholson said with a smile.