I’ve been attending Wilbur Cross for three years now. Every day I roam the halls and see signs about SAT testing and choosing a career. I hear announcements regarding anything from internships to making sure you stop at the College and Career Center to get more important information. The truth is, it can be a bit much. It is drilled into our heads that we should go straight into college as soon as we graduate high school and know exactly what it is we want to do for a living.
This pressure to decide our future now is even more evident in the school structure with our academy system. We are forced to decide what field we wish to go into and it is completely going against what makes Wilbur Cross unique and intriguing to students. Now, because I’m in the Law
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As adults who are responsible for making sure we are put on the right path to succeed, it can be a very daunting task. According to New Haven Independent, “21.0 percent of kids in the Class of 2012 dropped out” (Bailey, Melissa) of our high school. With the intense efforts of making students go to college immediately after graduation, it is very evident that schools are pushed from above (aka the school system) to justify their existence and are forced to compete with graduation rates. These pressures are not about the students but simply just politics, or a way of redemption for New Haven Public Schools. However, the burden of requiring us to make a decision is still unreasonable. It seems as though in addition to the school system, now even parents believe that going straight to college with a career plan is the only option for their kids!
Bottom line, there are other ways to have a good life. Making students feel as though these decisions are important is necessary, but we shouldn 't have ridiculous amounts of pressure piled on us to make major life decisions so quickly. I want my years of high school to be filled with exploration and open