Let Teenagers Try Adulthood Analysis

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High school is one thing that a vast majority of people have experienced. Several of those who are acquainted with the high school experience are well aware of how terrible it can be; it is "the mouth of a great demon biting and chewing and smushing people in the face" (Jesse Andrews) leaving us in ruins after we graduate. It is a place to put awkward teenagers that adults do not want to deal with. It is a place where individuality and dissent are encouraged, but also crushed. High school is simply irrelevant and overwhelming and it must be reevaluated. To begin, in the article "Let Teenagers Try Adulthood" by Leon Botstein, Botstein states, "…the rules of high school turn out not to be the rules of life." It is said that high school develops …show more content…

Teenagers go through a lot; as stated before, they are at a fragile age with hormones and all. Pressure flows in on them from friends, family, sports, academics, etcetera. We should relieve the pressure of academics just a little bit by lightening the homework and classwork loads. Spending seven hours a night on homework after a seven hour school day is not everyone 's ideal afternoon. Or, like Botstein had suggested in his article, we could have high school start after sixth grade and go through tenth grade. By doing so, it would teach kids the basics (reading, writing, math), allow kids to gain more experience in the real world, and allow them more time to pursue opportunities. According to Francine Prose in "I Know Why the Caged Bird Cannot Read", students are limited to their personal experiences. Kids are in school for thirteen to eighteen years (counting preschool, kindergarten, and college), so they do not really have any personal experience. By requiring high school to end at tenth grade kids are enabled to expand their experience and mature rapidly, we might also develop "goals that are worth striving for", a point made by Ravicth in her article. Lightening workloads and reducing school years are only two of several possibilities there are to fix high school for it not to be so irrelevant and