Silently she walks down the hall; unnoticed. Living from class to class, talking to no one. She’s just another face in the crowd, a crowd of eighteen hundred teenage students.
John F. Kennedy High School: for most school begins at eight and ends at two forty-five. There are six classes in a day, each approximately fifty-five minutes long. This is where the average teenage spends most of their life. It is one of the most important institutions to a teenager, whether they admit that or not. Why is it so important? Is it the knowledge they obtain? What about the activities they are involved in? Well, from the view point of a Kennedy student, teenagers live for their social status.
Social status, really? Because by law, people go to school to learn about important concepts such as math and science. They learn this in order to get into college, they go to college in order to get a job, they get a job in order to earn money, and why in the world would they want money? Because you can’t do anything in this world without money. That is why the government forces us to go to school, so we can make money. But, I know most students have no desire to go to school and learn. Why do they do it? The reason, it’s their own world. The hallways, passing time, activities, and sports events, everything students do is their own decision.
Teenagers are easily influenced. The media, the internet, even friends and family influence the lives of teenagers. That’s why school makes such a huge impact on a student. You become like those you surround yourself with. Students tend to hang out with people similar to them, with common interests or activities and at school you see these people at least five times a week if not more. So obviously, you will begin to change and become like each other. This is why cliques are such a big issue in the teenage world. Once you are in a group, you don’t leave, and peer pressure takes place. But it’s not the peer pressure that I want to focus on, it’s the
cliques: your little group of friends that you just can’t live without!
At Kennedy I notice that there are a lot of cliques. It doesn’t seem too harmful, but they still obviously exist. To start, we have the preps; these consist of the jocks, the cheerleaders, or rich kids who have the name brand clothes to fit in. Then we have our musical groups, show choir people tend to fit in the prep group as well, but they often divide up into their specific group. Of course there is the “band geeks”, who aren’t really geeks. As a whole they are band geeks, but they as well tend to divide off into different groups. And of course there is orchestra; it’s harder to tell how they divide up, but from my point of view, they are quite diverse and don’t tend to stick together outside of orchestra. Then you will have your smart kids, who are just geniuses and aren’t involved in anything else, thus they aren’t put in any other group. Next, is the “goths”, I suppose you can call them that. These are the kids who tend to dress in dark clothing, and I have found them to not be much different than anyone else. They just present themselves differently, and may be involved in the use of illegal substances as well, but that’s a common stereotype. In fact all these cliques are common stereotypes.
We have put ourselves into these cliques by how the world expects us too be; meaning that our family life often influences where we are socially placed in high school. The way we are raised, the morals our parents put on us, our environment as young children, all these are factors as to what we will want to do and be in high school. It may seem like we have made all the decisions, but we haven’t. In fact they were all made a head of time by our parents. Their expectations for us greatly influence how they decide to teach us their values and how they discipline us. The thing is, their expectations for us, goes back even farther! Their parents’ expectations for them influenced how they were brought up. It’s a never ending cycle of expectations.
Since expectations are our motivation, we find people of the same motivation level. These people become our friends and we tend to exclude others of different motivations. What I can’t seem to figure out, is why in the world we would do that? It only hurts others self esteem. It won’t kill you to try to include someone new to go to the movies or bowling. Now I understand if you hate a person, that will be tough, but why do teenagers have to be so harsh and judgmental?
We are all people. Though we dress differently and think differently, we are all people. It shouldn’t matter how much money we have or what we look like. In some way or another we are all crying out to be accepted. Acceptance is the key goal to high school students. And if everyone could get past looks or wealth, acceptance would be a lot easier. We all have heard the saying “don’t judge a book by its cover”, well in this case, don’t judge a person by their face. I challenge you to look deeper. Take the time to expand yourself, and trust me, you’ll find that everyone just wants to be loved.
John F. Kennedy High School: for most school begins at eight and ends at two forty-five. There are six classes in a day, each approximately fifty-five minutes long. This is where the average teenage spends most of their life. It is one of the most important institutions to a teenager, whether they admit that or not. Why is it so important? Is it the knowledge they obtain? What about the activities they are involved in? Well, from the view point of a Kennedy student, teenagers live for their social status.
Social status, really? Because by law, people go to school to learn about important concepts such as math and science. They learn this in order to get into college, they go to college in order to get a job, they get a job in order to earn money, and why in the world would they want money? Because you can’t do anything in this world without money. That is why the government forces us to go to school, so we can make money. But, I know most students have no desire to go to school and learn. Why do they do it? The reason, it’s their own world. The hallways, passing time, activities, and sports events, everything students do is their own decision.
Teenagers are easily influenced. The media, the internet, even friends and family influence the lives of teenagers. That’s why school makes such a huge impact on a student. You become like those you surround yourself with. Students tend to hang out with people similar to them, with common interests or activities and at school you see these people at least five times a week if not more. So obviously, you will begin to change and become like each other. This is why cliques are such a big issue in the teenage world. Once you are in a group, you don’t leave, and peer pressure takes place. But it’s not the peer pressure that I want to focus on, it’s the
cliques: your little group of friends that you just can’t live without!At Kennedy I notice that there are a lot of cliques. It doesn’t seem too harmful, but they still obviously exist. To start, we have the preps; these consist of the jocks, the cheerleaders, or rich kids who have the name brand clothes to fit in. Then we have our musical groups, show choir people tend to fit in the prep group as well, but they often divide up into their specific group. Of course there is the “band geeks”, who aren’t really geeks. As a whole they are band geeks, but they as well tend to divide off into different groups. And of course there is orchestra; it’s harder to tell how they divide up, but from my point of view, they are quite diverse and don’t tend to stick together outside of orchestra. Then you will have your smart kids, who are just geniuses and aren’t involved in anything else, thus they aren’t put in any other group. Next, is the “goths”, I suppose you can call them that. These are the kids who tend to dress in dark clothing, and I have found them to not be much different than anyone else. They just present themselves differently, and may be involved in the use of illegal substances as well, but that’s a common stereotype. In fact all these cliques are common stereotypes.
We have put ourselves into these cliques by how the world expects us too be; meaning that our family life often influences where we are socially placed in high school. The way we are raised, the morals our parents put on us, our environment as young children, all these are factors as to what we will want to do and be in high school. It may seem like we have made all the decisions, but we haven’t. In fact they were all made a head of time by our parents. Their expectations for us greatly influence how they decide to teach us their values and how they discipline us. The thing is, their expectations for us, goes back even farther! Their parents’ expectations for them influenced how they were brought up. It’s a never ending cycle of expectations.
Since expectations are our motivation, we find people of the same motivation level. These people become our friends and we tend to exclude others of different motivations. What I can’t seem to figure out, is why in the world we would do that? It only hurts others self esteem. It won’t kill you to try to include someone new to go to the movies or bowling. Now I understand if you hate a person, that will be tough, but why do teenagers have to be so harsh and judgmental?
We are all people. Though we dress differently and think differently, we are all people. It shouldn’t matter how much money we have or what we look like. In some way or another we are all crying out to be accepted. Acceptance is the key goal to high school students. And if everyone could get past looks or wealth, acceptance would be a lot easier. We all have heard the saying “don’t judge a book by its cover”, well in this case, don’t judge a person by their face. I challenge you to look deeper. Take the time to expand yourself, and trust me, you’ll find that everyone just wants to be loved.
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