Last Saturday, I had the extremely rare pleasure of going to see a movie…in theaters…less than two weeks after it had premiered! Even more wonderful, it was a choice time to spend some one-on-one time with my dad, whose schedule is about as packed as my own on most weekends and all weekdays.

I had made the somewhat risky choice, though, of going to see “Enchanted”, a movie that one can only describe as the quintessential chick flick.  Not action, not adventure, and definitely not horror.  It wasn’t even a standard romance. The audience consisted mostly of 6 to 8 year olds; the closest people to my age were some preteen girls wearing lipgloss and dress-code-defying tank tops despite the chilly winter day. The fathers in the audience bore pained looks.

I’ll admit I was worried. I myself am not a “girly-girl”.  I don’t reach for mascara in the morning, rarely wear skirts, and my split-ends are hacked off with scissors instead of conditioned into glossy tresses.  I feared that if I myself was worried about the movie, my long-suffering dad (who would have much rather seen “Beowulf”) would be disgusted.

As the movie started, my anxiety increased. “Enchanted” was animated, to a much greater extent than I had thought. My dad hates animated movies!  When the singing started, I was horrified.  I knew that singing and dancing are ranked about the same as animated movies in my dad’s opinion.  True, the script was funny and there were hilarious references to previous Disney movies, but I had lured my NYC-raised dad with the promise of a New York setting–a place that didn’t seem remotely related to the cheesy, song-filled, animated paradise before us.

But I didn’t need to be worried.  The plot carried, my dad and I both cracked up, and even the songs went well.  My dad leaned over to whisper a running commentary during the New York scenes, explaining where exactly in Central Park or Manhattan a scene was taking place.   As the credits rolled, he even made me stay back to see the names of some of the actors.

Walking out of the theater, I asked him if he’d liked it.  He grinned.

“I could have waited for the DVD,” he said. “But seeing a movie with you was worth the extra money.”

-Aliya Deri

Winter Break lasts two weeks in my school district.  That means that there’s a swing every few years between starting extremely late or ending extremely early.  The early ending is really early–one year school began again on January 2nd.  This year, however, we’ve swung the other way.  School gets out on the 21st, a mere four days before Christmas.  So, four days before Santa starts his trips and three days before I actually start wrapping presents, I’ll be studying for tests and finishing off homework.

Although I don’t actually have a choice (especially with this year’s schedule, which makes an early break impossible), I’d actually prefer the other setting.  Starting Winter Break late has prevented me from putting up a Christmas tree the past few years, made me do less shopping that I would have liked, and made my December much more stressful.  Even worse, finals are in January, and a late Winter Break means that teachers have less time to prepare students for finals.  There are also a solid four weeks before Winter Break begins, as the posters around my school cheerfully reminded me all this week.

It’s some consolation that students in any districts that opt for the early break will be in school when I’m still enjoying my second week.  But although I might savor my vacation a little later, I know that it will cost me when I return to school, facing only a few weeks of review between me and exams.

Everyone in high school, or at least mine, seems to be competing for the “hardest year” prize. Freshman complain constantly about more homework, tough grading, and upperclassmen bullies. Sophomores worry about their first AP classes; juniors whine about the PSAT and SAT; seniors cram in college applications and essays despite rampant “senioritis”.

It’s definitely true that as the years pass, students usually start taking harder classes and competing more for college. As a junior, I’m taking a course load I’d never have imagined in freshman year, along with jobs and extracurriculars. Just by looking at my schedule, I can tell that I’m extremely busy, even overextended, this year. So why am I less stressed out?

I don’t think my work ethic or drive has diminished over the past three years. I get approximately the same grades in classes that are much harder, and I rarely waste time. I seem to be working harder, but I feel like I’m actually working a lot less.

I can’t speak for everyone else, because everyone has a different high school experience. But I think I’ve become more capable, or at least “smarter” student. I manage my time better, rarely overscheduling, and I absorb ideas faster and retain them for longer. Tests no longer make me panic; in-class essays barely make me flinch. I’ve definitely increased my workload at school and outside of it, but at the same time my capacities have increased. On paper my junior year might look harder, but I’ve matured enough to make it a manageable task.

Happy Thanksgiving! and, most especially, Happy Thanksgiving Break!

-Aliya

Early Monday morning, a fellow student at my high school, junior Billy Russell, was run over by a train in an apparent suicide.

The news came as a shock to everyone at school. Our principal made a curt intercom announcement before brunch calling all faculty to the library. Ten minutes later, at the beginning of fourth period, an ordinary week became a time of mourning and sorrow.

I didn’t know Billy Russell. I can’t place his face or his name with a personality. I never spoke with him or had a class with him. I can’t pick him out from among a crowd. But after his death, everyone in my grade–including me–is finding ways to associate themselves with a boy many of us did not know.

He wasn’t a loner. He had a girlfriend and a group of close friends. A girl who sat beside him in history sits behind me in biology; she is surprised and saddened every time she turns to him and sees only an empty desk. Some of his friends were my friends, dazed by the visible and emotional hole that he left behind him. But what frightens me more is that many of them were not surprised by his death. One of my friends said that “it was something Billy would do.”

Without ever meeting Billy, I find myself incredibly saddened by his death. I feel like Billy’s death extinguished my only chance to know him, to meet him, and, however unlikely, to turn away his future. And I feel that Billy’s apparent choice–whatever his reasons–extinguished all of his chances to intervene in the lives of others. He had lost so much hope that he no longer had a future.

At the front of my school is a temporary shrine for Billy. Flowers, notes, and a picture of three boys smiling. I cannot tell you which boy is Billy. That is, perhaps, the greatest sadness: that we as teens have made a society that isolates. We build up walls, we cut out people with cliques and groups and stereotypes. We mostly do not share our true feelings with our friends; when our friends confide in us, we either laugh it off or pledge secrecy. When one of us is truly in danger, our community can no longer support the ones who need it most.

-Aliya

This school year, my school district has been reformulating a lot of our curriculum, so I’ve ended up with new books in 3 classes this year. These books weren’t on campus at the end of the last school year for us to use as references for summer homework; they arrived, in fact, about three to six weeks after school had already started. Fortunately, no one was badly impacted. Teachers simply reused old textbooks (which weren’t really over 5 or 6 years old) until the new books arrived.

What I find interesting is that two of these three teachers required students to give the old textbooks back; the other teacher asked, but did not require, students to return the old textbooks. All three teachers said that these books could be sold to other districts for profit.

Granted, none of these books were older than 8 years, and all of them were in usable condition. Yet I find it frightening that my community, which is predominantly white and affluent, should be able to sell books that our schools find unacceptable to other public school districts. Free schooling is one of the great equalizers in America. Under ideal circumstances, it should provide the poorest child with the opportunity to learn at the same level as a child in a richer community. It should show that the American government does not discriminate against its youngest citizens.

I understand that poorer districts cannot always buy new books and that used books are not necessarily bad. But I can’t understand why poorer districts may be dependent on books from richer districts, suffering if administrators or teachers in a wealthier school procrastinated on ordering their books. I can’t understand what happened to the old textbooks that these school districts presumably had last year. Above all, I can’t understand why I receive pristine books, an excellent education, and numerous opportunities that an inner-city student simply cannot experience, when we are paying exactly the same amount of money to attend school.

Our public school system should never become a pecking order.

Why do we, as teens, turn to alcohol? You can come up with a dozen hypothetical reasons for why high-schoolers and even middle schoolers waste their time and energy on illegal substances: to get the thrill, to relieve stress, to fit in. And despite the best efforts of education experts, teens have clung tenaciously to alcohol. Some may claim that shows like Gossip Girl cause underage drinking, but I hesitate to say that TV shows create our culture. It is our culture, our society that shapes what we see on television, and there is something culturally wrong with how American society views underage drinking and educates teenagers about alcohol.

Take tobacco, for example. Mention cigarette smoking to any sixth-grader, and they will immediately envision the pictures of blackened lungs that their health teacher showed them and the long lists of toxic chemicals found inside a cigarette. They may think of a popular sticker that says “Kissing a smoker is like licking an ashtray.” They will remember a movie that ended with a smoker in a hospital room, stricken with lung cancer and surrounded by crying family members. These educational drives have made smoking drop drastically, especially among teenagers. Everyone knows that smoking’s not a gamble. There is a one hundred percent chance that tobacco will harm your body.

But alcohol awareness programs don’t seem to have the same effect. My school district’s DARE program, run by the police department, bombards students with facts about illegal substances from elementary school onward. My high school holds an “Every Fifteen Minutes” program every year, in which a student is pulled out from a class every fifteen minutes to signify a death from drunk driving. The school stages a mock accident in which family and friends mourn the loss of a loved one who died from someone else’s bad judgment. And while students may cry during these emotionally charged presentations, it doesn’t seem to stop them from buying a keg for their next after-game party.

It’s all about the odds, really. No matter how terrible a drunk-driving accident is, it’s still only a risk. And teenagers rise to the occasion when presented with the “challenge” of buying and consuming alcohol. Police officers are, after all, authority figures whose rules can be circumvented and evaded. Teenagers see underage drinking as a crime, and, like all crimes, there’s always a chance that you’ll get away.

Since current awareness methods don’t seem to work, perhaps American public schools should try a different approach to prevent underage drinking. Replace handcuffs and smashed cars with medical diagrams; bring doctors as well as policemen to schools. Without deemphasizing the effects of drunk driving, educators should directly counteract the “glamor” of celebrity drinking as they did with smoking. For every limoncello and wild party that the media shows to us on television, for every chic woman with a martini and sexy man with a beer, drive home the images of damaged brain cells, swollen livers, and cirrhosis. Change alcohol’s dangers from a risk to a certainty and you will change teens’ views about drinking.

-Aliya Deri

Twice a year, counselors at my high school visit students’ English classes to review the courses necessary for graduating high school and attending college. Their speeches are usually met with the usual responses: annoyance at the seeming “waste” of a class, relief at the postponement of an essay or quiz, or even happiness at having a free period for sleeping. A few weeks ago, I noted the counselors’ presentation with my usual indifference, marking it with only a casual slash in my organizer.

This year, however, the presentation had a different effect. As the counselor skimmed through lists of course requirements, I noticed that my high school requires just one year of either a foreign language or a fine arts course. In stark contrast, however, the prestigious UC system requires at least two years of a foreign language–and even recommends three years.

Why is the study of a foreign language considered a defining characteristic of college-bound students? Many might argue such a requirement’s validity. After all, much of the world is conversant in English, especially in business and the tourism industries. Many Americans will never even leave the States. And indeed, there were some groans in the class when the counselor emphasized this UC requirement.

Several years ago, I too might have disliked the language requirement. Both my parents are multilingual to some extent, sharing between them at least some fluency in French, German, Bengali, Hindi, and Japanese. Since they only share English as a common language, I grew up speaking only English, like the majority of Americans. My parents have often insisted that being multilingual broadens one’s cultural perceptions, but I was skeptical. Studying a language has always seemed to be a laborious exercise in grammar and vocabulary, too slow to culminate in fluency.

But by the time of my counselor’s presentation, my perception had changed drastically. Just the day before, I had had an intensive hour-long discussion about a novel. The novel–and, for that matter, the discussion–were in French, part of my course in French literature.

It was not until I was sitting in my English classroom, reflecting upon that discussion, that I realized the relevance of studying a foreign language. The sheer magnitude of my achievement astounded me. In six years of studying French, I had changed from an English-speaking sixth grader into a junior capable of writing essays, reading poetry, understanding lectures–all in another language. The accumulated experiences of each of those years had given me more than grammar rules and dictionary definitions: they had left me cultural connotations, nuances, and shades of meaning deeper than any crash course’s curriculum.

Admittedly, two or three years of studying a foreign language cannot equal longer courses of study. But the knowledge obtained from even one year of a language is invaluable. It cannot be found in any other subject, because all other subjects use the same cultural matrix that all English-speakers know and are familiar with. Having experienced the cultural awareness that only a learning second language can bring, I no longer wonder that the length of the UC system’s language requirement, but at its shortness.
–Aliya