It’s a common story: An immigrant moves to the United States and takes a low-paying job with obscenely long hours to make ends meet. These people, overworked and underpaid, often receive very little recognition or respect. This sentiment is well embodied by Lake Braddock’s own custodial staff.

Between dealing with the rampant littering in the hallways, the general lack of clean-up in the cafeteria or any of the other sanitation and maintenance issues throughout the school, the custodial staff does a lot for the student population. And, often times, they do it without receiving any gratitude.

“I feel like the custodians do so much for us that we may or may not even realize, and we do nothing for them in return,” senior Carly Shapiro said. “They make sure our school is clean and do a lot for us and a majority of the school doesn’t even have the decency to say ‘thank you.’”

At Lake Braddock, the custodians work two shifts. One shift runs from 5:30 a.m., when the school opens, until 3:30 p.m., and the other starts at 3:30 p.m. and ends at midnight, when the school closes. This means that many custodians work 45-plus hour work weeks with exceptionally early or late hours. Often, careers that involve late or early overtime hours are considered valiant and respectable. Why are school custodians not given the same deference?

Guerry Cespedes, the school building superintendent, manages all of the custodial staff. While he doesn’t work with students on a daily basis, Cespedes said that the staff deserve more than indifference or apathy from the school.

“All of the kids are not always behaving themselves,” Cespedes said. “There’s always someone trying to give you a hard time.”

One shining example of a custodian deserving of students’ respect is Georgina Okra. Okra, a long-time custodian at Lake Braddock, moved from Bodomase, Ghana in 1996, and started working at Lake Braddock in 1998. After six years of the evening shift she was given the morning shift—and a promotion. As a custodian II, Okra oversees the other custodians in the building. She has been working as a Custodian II ever since.

Despite working at Lake Braddock for nearly 17 years, Okra is still thankful for her job and finds enjoyment in it every day.

“[My favorite part] is when the kids are here,” Okra said. “When the kids are here, time goes fast. I like it. Over the summer, time goes slow.”

While Fairfax County does celebrate a “Custodian Appreciation Week” on Feb. 23-27, it is not enough to simply give each custodian a thank you note and a gift card from the SGA; every day should be “Custodian Appreciation Day.”

While being a part of any custodial staff is a tough job, it’s doubly difficult at a school. Lake Braddock’s custodians work preposterously hard with little appreciation, and it is about time they received an ounce of appreciation from the student body.