For three years in middle school, students are told what to expect in high school and how much different it is. Teachers explain how what they’re doing is preparing them for it, but when high school really comes it’s nothing like they described it was. The new high schoolers are left to work things out for themselves, with new workloads and figuring out time management for the first time.

There has to be a better way to prepare students for high school because no matter how many powerpoints counselors give, it’s different for every person. Everyone knows the things that are supposed to help you, the broad terms like “managing your time,” and “don’t procrastinate,”  but it’s harder to apply them to real life.

I believe that the best way to survive high school is through experience, and finding out what works best for a person.

It’s easier to learn from experience because people learn from their mistakes, constantly correcting to find what works best and what’s the most efficient and productive. When someone makes a mistake, they remember what they did wrong, and when a similar situation comes up again, they know what to do.

For example, someone could plan to finish a project early on and not procrastinate as everyone tells them not to, but then they still keep pushing it off. Then they are rushing the night the project is due and are sleep deprived and stressed. Next time a project rolls around, they will remember this and make more time for the project because they don’t want to go through that again.

 One of the hardest things about high school is the stress, going back and forth between school and extracurriculars. In middle school, the work was about the same for everyone and faster, but now there are more levels of classes and after-school activities are more of a commitment. 

 Some might say that Bowie is handling preparing new high school students well, with seminars held in the first nine weeks giving advice from counselors and upper-classmen. But the seminars were found annoying by some students when they could be actually working during FIT, and the tips were not that helpful.

I think that a solution to help students is making mandatory groups of freshmen that could meet up once a week during FIT during the first nine weeks to help each other with work.

Another thing that could be helpful in general is if teachers ease into the workload a little more, not just piling everything on immediately. Maybe even just taking suggestions from students on what they think would make things easier and what’s not working.

To help freshmen adjust to high school, Bowie should put in place more hands-on programs that will let students find their way around high school and adapt, without as much of a struggle as there is now.