Caleb+B’s+OpEd+Article



Each and every one of us have one thing in common, we’ve spent almost our entire lives in school. Most of us chasing the same thing; good grades. We are taught to excel academically whether we want to or not, for it is just the norm. It seems as if high school (particularly at Foothill) is what determines where we will be and what we will do for the rest of our lives, putting an intense amount of pressure on us growing, hormonal teenagers. We are brainwashed into robots that take six different classes of diverse subjects and strive to be perfect in all of them.

Now do we really enjoy it? Do I enjoy going to multiple high level classes each and every day only to come out overwhelmed with hours of homework and a fried brain? Do I enjoy going to Trig class and learning how to graph parabolas? Do I enjoy sitting in my bedroom every single Sunday night in the final hours of my weekend before another hectic week starts doing homework? The answer is a big, fat, ugly, juicy, hairy, slimy NO.

And when I think of all of the other things I could be doing, I lose a couple of brain cells.

To plainly say it; I do not like the fact that I go to school every day and put in many hours to learning things that I do not enjoy and know I will never use. Am I trying to say schools should stop teaching all subjects and encouraging students to explore them? No. And I am aware that many people do love their school subjects and will go on in their lives happily studying them, even as a career. But as a Junior in high school I have learned more than basic math, more than basic science and more than basic history and it is time for me to discover what I love and pursue it, and better now than after years of college.

What if high school was about finding ourselves? Finding our passions? About pursuing what we love, whatever (reasonable) thing that may be? For example, I know that singing and making music is what I will be doing for the rest of my life. It is what makes my happier than anything else. And if I solely focused on that, I would be ahead of myself and my future. Or what about the kid that wants to be a doctor? What if their main focus was science? Or the future psychologist spent most of their time studying psychology? Yet for some reason these others and I have almost no choice but to cram in math, science, history, english, spanish and art, all while trying to do what we love.

I know that the system will never change and that it is virtually impossible to try and do so, but I think that high school should ultimately be about making and sacrificing time to do what we love. I don’t think it should be about staying up all night doing homework and trying to be perfect socially and academically, but rather making the most of our young years as they quickly move by.