October 07, 2007

• My graduating class is having its 50th reunion this year, and I'm not going to that, either. But, you know what, I did like high school. The thing is that I attended 7 different schools through the 12th grade, so was used to leaving things and people behind. That was then, and there were a lot more nows that followed. Why did I like HS? It started out that I was good at school,and got some self-confidence in a teacher's pettish sort of way. But, in last 2 years, I found that I could look for trouble while still being a slightly cynical achiever. "Trouble", at the time was much more innocent than it is these days. I drove the family station wagon at 100 mph over Rocky Hill, dragged Main Steet to the point that I could identify cars from their headlights, fell drastically in love with a guy that didn't love me back and was completely wrong for me (ah, the drama.) Kept a pint of sloe gin under the seat of my 1939 Ford to mix with lemonade at the drive in, wrote off-center articles for the school newspaper, and managed to get access to student records, so I knew what everyone's IQ score was and who had threatened a teacher with a knife. Then I left for college. I guess I'll never understand the emotions that many people seem to invest in high school.
• Not me, I dropped out when I realized I could sign up for classes at the local junior college.
• I went to an arts magnet school housed as part of a traditional high school. Sang a solo at the homecoming game, skipped the dance, and didn't do any of the traditional end-of-high school bullshit. That being said, I loved high school, probably because I was in a heavy-duty performing arts program. I went on to teach high school vocal music for six years after college.
• didn't like them then, don't care about 'em now. not paying good money to go back.
• The last couple years of high school were a mostly hellish and pointless experience for me too, GramMa. Had great grades and was a good little pupil until about the 10th grade when the bullshit (or puberty) finally hit me. I eventually stopped going altogether, never graduated and, like Hommie, went the college route instead. I made life-long friends in high school, some of whom look back fondly on the time and go to all the reunions, but it just weren't for me. Square peg - round hole, I guess. Me old Dad, who attended his 65th reunion this summer, says he hated high school too and was actually looking forward to going to war when he graduated in 1942.
• In Australia we don't have Homecoming or cheerleaders. At my school we did have prefects but it wasn't seen as being all that cool to be one. No class presidents or anything like that. So we don't have as much of the pressure as there seems to be for US high schools. Also we usually were uniforms so there isn't a big deal about clothes or fashion either. Makes life a bit easier.
• I went to one Homecoming when I was still in high school, as a favor to a friend. He attended the magnet school across town, it was their Homecoming, they were playing my high school, and he wanted to shock people by bringing a date from that school. His school burned an effigy of our mascot, our marching band slashed the opposition's tires in the parking lot during the 3rd quarter, and the game ended with a fight on the field where someone got a nice scalp wound from a flying first aid kit. Oh yeah, the magnet school won, something like 70-0. High school did much to prepare me for the real world. ;-)
• I hated high school so much I became a teacher.
• The Homecoming dance was fun. It wasn't a formal bring-a-date-and-wear-a-dress occasion at my small-town school, but it was the first dance of the year, so you got to release all the boogie you'd been saving up all summer. The sports side of it was pretty nonexistent for me; I always brought a book to the compulsory pep rally. We also did that thing where each day of the week was a different dress-up day (School Color Day, Class Color Day, Formal Day, Hawaiian Day, etc.) And that was fun because, hey, dressing up is fun!
• VeraG: I don't remember how old you are, but you sound like the hell raisers I'm babysitting teaching now. CaptainSunshine: I can't tell if you're being sarcastic or not. ?? I was recently hired full time as a ParaEducator -- not-quite-a-teacher -- and that's why I was at the assembly. Believe me, I'd hesitated before I accepted the job. Figured it would be OK, but I just never even thought I'd have to attend ANOTHER DAMN HOMECOMING. OMG!! Flashbacks!! Mostly I can keep it down to minor indigestion, but that was the worst. I'm liking the kids, even though the ones I'm with are the short bus gang and the "bad attitudes." These are the kids that aren't having much fun. Even though I'd like to run away to elementary school, my high school experience makes me want to help these kids get through. What bothered me most then was that I was SO. DAMN. BORED. Pointless crap, as Islander said. I remember having shitty grades and constantly being verbally abused by my aunt and uncle about underachieving and being a loser. Oddly enough, about 15 years later, when I looked at my transcripts to go to college, I realized I'd been in the top 1/3--which means there were some kids with REALLY shitty grades who managed to slip through. What's amazing is that I love to learn. I loved college and would be a perennial student, if I could. I love Science and English, and I like taking tests, especially essay tests. Just goes to show how crappy the educational system is.
• I too hated high school primarily due to an intense, soul-searing level of boredom with the teenaged world. I just couldn't wait to get out of that torrid little fishbowl. but we didn't have homecoming, we didn't have a football team at my very small, very nerdy, catholic prep school.
• At my high school we had sex parties and made men-in-panties videos. I would have gone to the homecoming dance if I hadn't been golden-showering.
• So you guys had Homecu... oh, nevermind.
• Path, I think you and I ran in very similar crowds. At the beginning of senior year I got the counselor to show me how to calculate the cumulative GPA. With my SAT score, I could literally fail every class and still have plenty of GPA to get into college. So I did. When the teachers came to me all concerned, I just showed them the math. They had nothing to say to that. It remains one of my crowning achievements.
• That would have been in the 80s, infer my age as you will. ;-) It was very much the high school of bad attitudes. When I said my friend wanted to shock his classmates by bringing a date from "that" school, I didn't mean "the opposing team". I can't say I hated going there, most of my friends went there too, but I was certainly bored.
• Do any of you who were bored back then now understand that boredom was your choice? School, like work and life in general is not there to entertain you. Entertainment is up to you, as is achievement. I'm not meaning to cut y'all down, but life is as you make it. Well, yes, there are outside influences like rape, beatings, etc., that are out of our control, but day-to-day life is something I'm thankful for since I've had a really good time, in spite of some downturns.
• Well, I loved high school, but I have to disagree with you, Path. Certain things, like the homecoming assembly, we were required to go to. Entertainment being up to me, I'd have chosen something different to do with those two hours. I was bored during that period of time. Funnily, I had a blast my senior year, but have had absolutely no desire to go back or see any of those people. Once it was done, it was done.
• Schools like to make their Homecoming Game be a game that they are likely to win. My high school football team was terrible, so I played in many Homecoming Games. Of course, I only went to the Homecoming Dance at my own school. I don't remember too much about it. It was a dance. I loved high school. I thought it was the greatest thing ever. I loved college, too. I was very aware at both times that I was in an artificial environment surrounded by people my own age with many things in common (geographic region, economic background, etc.). I knew that would never happen in the real world again. I really don't understand too well the people who didn't enjoy high school. There were so many people that it should have been relatively easy to find someone with whom you share a lot in common. It's not like working at a company where you might be the only person of your age or gender or race. In high school, everyone had some things in common with you. I knew all my meals were paid for. I liked that. I knew that I was going to go to college no matter what happened. I had no idea what I would do with my life, but I didn't really care. I could decide that later. I just wanted to have as much fun as I possibly could. So I did.
• I have to disagree with you as well, path. It wasn't a question of being entertained, but learning should be engaging and challenging, and it was neither sitting in an overcrowded classroom listening to an overworked, overwhelmed teacher read to you from a 30 year old textbook. Or sitting in class doing pointless busywork, like copying multiplication tables in high school. For the record, I absolutely loved college. It was an entirely different world, even the more tedious labs weren't so bad.
• Despite watching "Mean Girls" a total of 517 times now, I have never actually understood the American rituals of homecoming. From what you people are saying, I take it that the local football team goes on a gruelling off-season tour (presumably of Europe or South America) and you all go to school in their abandoned stadium. When they return - or "come home" - a King and Queen is elected from the student population to lead the battle against the athletic warriors, in the hope of maintaining your possession of the building. However, there are rarely enough weapons in the school armoury for each student, and many are left in reserve, cowering in the changing rooms, placating the youngest and most frightened children. It seems that many of you were in this situation and found it "boring" because you yearn for battle, the field of spears; to crush the bones and shed the blood of your enemies (which you call "sword's drink" or "the piss of death," in your barbaric language). Then you all have a "slow dance" and teachers maintain a minimum distance between any two would-be lovers via the application of a magic tape-measure.
• BlueHorse- Totally serious. Of course, where I work is the polar opposite of the school I attended. I am glad you enjoy your new charges BH, it's a really fun job.
• I loved some of high school, and hated some of it, too. The learning part was a blast. The social group I hung with was comprised of over-achieving fringe types, kids not yet known to be gay, brainiacs, and really literate types with great senses of humor who weren't particularly attractive. It was a nice bunch and I thought myself lucky, especially since many declared themselves my lifelong friends. Years passed, reality set in. One really nice guy found religion, which ironically turned him into an intolerant bastard ("what do you mean members of our group were gay? I would never have been consciously friends with gay people!") Several found very lucrative careers ("I'm taking the wife to Paris for her 40th birthday and buying her diamonds; how's your stock portfolio doing?") and several simply vanished or died. I have perhaps one "friend" from that time remaining and she lives 3,000 miles away, not likely to attend anything locally. Reunions are a waste for me, as the only kids attending our school's seem to be the same people I avoided back when, and THEY haven't changed a bit. The 70s were not a good period for developing school spirit, at least not among those I knew, and none of my then-friends had anything to do with events like "homecoming." Then I went to college, and learned the true meaning of "homecoming": it was an excuse for massive drinking followed by explosive projectile vomiting. I usually spent those hiding in the library so I wouldn't get stuck babysitting passed-out drunks. Now "homecoming" for me means going to my house after I finish the workday. Ya-hoo.
• Path and 'nockle: I have to disagree, also. Maybe some expect to be entertained, but many teenagers like a challenge. I wanted to learn and be challenged, and even then, the classes were dummied down to the lowest common denominator. (Don't get me started on how we hold the best and the brightest back to the level of the slowest.) I used to hold my textbook up to hide the library book I was reading behind it. It's pretty bad when you can be engrossed in a library book, and still be able to answer the stupid questions the teacher asks when you're called on. Problem was, some classes were so boring, I blew them off and didn't do homework. A's on tests + F in homework = C- average. For me, engagement didn't happen until I was out of high school and into college. I went to a small town high school in PA, and if you weren't in, you were waaaay out. You were plugged into a slot, and there was no getting out of it. If you weren't good at sports, you either weren't selected, or the coaches would help to laugh you off the team. I would have loved to do chess club, woodworking, welding, or FFA, but back then, in that town, girls didn't do that. Not to mention kids who did anything manual were automatically put out of the academic track. Except home ec for girls--I fought tooth and nail not to go into home ec, and I won that battle. The VP called me "unfeminine." RIGHT ON!! What I absolutely hated is what you loved, 'nockle: an artificial environment surrounded by people my own age with many things in common (geographic region, economic background, etc.) I'm much happier in a group of diverse elements with differing viewpoints. To me, that makes for an exciting learning experience every day. What I hated was not being able to think So much of high school is preparation to be a worker drone. We weren't expected to think, just to do the mindless, pointless busywork that VeraG alludes to. As far as sitting in an overcrowded classroom listening to an overworked, overwhelmed teacher read to you from a 30 year old textbook well, now the textbooks in the school I'm teaching in are 60 years old, there's 4-5 more students in each overcrowded class, the heat/air doesn't work right, the plaster is coming down, the rooms stink, the blinds are broken on the west side, there's no decent lab, and on and on. Don't tell me these kids can't figure out how much value is placed on education in this community. Raising your hand to go to the bathroom was really special, too. I tell my kids they're adult enough not to have to ask to go potty. They have the right and the privilege to go to the restroom when they need to. As adults, they should "take care of business" before class, but sometimes the Pepsi gets to you before the ninety minute class time ends, so go quickly and quietly without disturbing the class. Abuse the privilege, however, and prepare to ask to go potty for the rest of the year. It's pretty amazing how even the rowdies can rise to the the responsibility given them if you hold them in high expectation. The one good thing I'll say for my high school is that during the Viet Nam war, we had several sit-ins as protest. Even if half the kids outside were just there to cut class and enjoy the sunshine, there were still some that had the courage of conviction to stand outside and chant, "Hell NO, we won't go!" MonkeyFilter: comprised of over-achieving fringe types MonkeyFilter: an excuse for massive drinking followed by explosive projectile vomiting High School did prepare me for taglines and juvenile humor!
• GET OUT OF MY HEAD GRAMMA
• I missed my high school reunions because they never contacted me and it wasn't on my radar. I am, however, attending my 10 year college reunion this week, and so far it's been pretty fun. Of course, half of what I'm looking forward to is going to classes taught by some really good lecturers, so that may not jibe with other people's idea of fun.