BY BROGAN HENNESY
High School is coming. Though it felt like the day would never come, I have less than a semester left of eighth grade. Then I will start a new phase of my life. I’ll repeat the process of going to a new school, meeting new teachers, taking new classes, and being at the “bottom of the food chain.”
Ever since I got back from winter break, I have noticed that the teachers and school has taken planning past even freshman year. We are starting to talk about college, and even thinking about careers.
It feels like freshman year seems so far off, now I need to think about attending college? What I want to do for a living?
There is a problem with this idea; I don’t have a clue about the choices I have to make for high school, and those choices affect college, which affects my career. I don’t know how to sign up for Driver’s Ed, much less taking college-credit classes.
And the most confusing part about this planning? We aren’t even focused on high school or even college. I feel like we have jumped straight to what our lives will look like in 10 years when we will have jobs.
On Jan. 15, the eighth grade had a field trip to the iHotel for the 29th Annual Career Day. The two categories I was put in were Arts and Communication, and Human Services.
I was confused about how I got sorted into the categories I was put in. I knew that the groups were based on the career surveys we took in class, but I didn’t know exactly what they looked for when sorting us, and exactly what qualities they based their pick on.
Throughout the trip, I listened to a graphic designer, a chef, a radio broadcaster, an entrepreneur, and a few other speakers. The speakers talked about how they got involved in their career, and a couple qualities that is required for their job.
What they didn’t talk about was their schooling. I wondered to myself “are we supposed to know what kind of schooling you need to have this job?”
Also, I was puzzled by what exactly each speaker did. I feel like their speeches were oriented around their engagement with their job, not what their job consists of.
Overall, I feel like Career Day didn’t talk about jobs; it talked about the people that have them.
So now, I am supposed to have an idea on what I want to do when I grow up, without actually knowing how I can get there.
So that got me thinking.
One thing that I wanted was to start at square one: freshman year. I feel it is important to know now what classes I need to take, and what year to take them. Also, I want to know what electives prepare me for different kinds of jobs.
Also, right now, I would like a very brief description of college, and how my later years of high school will prepare me for this. I don’t know anything about Masters or Bachelors degrees, and I’m curious to learn about how I get each degree, and how long I have to study for.
Finally, I would like to know about the schooling that is required for different jobs. Such as, what classes to take and what degree you need.
I feel like I have to know the answers to all of my questions without being taught them. The focus seemed to be off about these discussions in school.
In my opinion, this process needs to be taken one step at a time. More has been bitten off than can be chewed, especially when I don’t know what I’m eating. It’s not like this can be left unanswered, because I will need to start this process in a couple of months.
Students need some help with this. We’ve learned a lot, but we don’t know everything. Jumping right into the thick of this is not the best way it can be handled. I feel that being fully invested in something that is happening over eight years from now won’t prepare me if I am uneducated. For now, I’m going to take a breath on the subject of being an adult and focus on being a kid. Because now I’m starting to see that I won’t be a kid forever!
