Why is high school so horrible?

I will start this node in the words of one of the few intelligent persons on televison today.
"I don't mean to get off on a rant now..." -Dennis Miller

Well there are many reasons why high school is so horrible.

One of these reasons is that American high schools are just as overcrowded as the prison system in America is. One thing I remember reading in The Moon is a Harsh Mistress by Robert A. Heinlein is this: paraphrased 'You ever notice that they always paint prisons, mental institutions, and schools, green to subdue the prisoners? Another reason is that high school is also full of immature, disobediant, adolescent, imbeciles. The third reason that comes to mind is that there are a few teachers that actually care for their students, and even treat their students with respect. High schools also discourage being different, acting different, looking different, thinking different, and thinking independently from the status quo. High schools encourage obeying to authority without question. High schools thus discourage questioning authority, especially when it is inanely stupid or anal retentive. High school is also the one thing that is destroying me and many others emotionally, physically and psychologically. High schools are usally funded by the government and could be compared to a totalitarian state. I have one more year after I finish this, and I go to college. I hope to change the world, which many people tell me you can't do. I hope to change the world, high schools, and many other things. People tell me I won't or I can't but that just encourages me. I am working on the main solutions on this but right now the only one I can think of is to do what they did in the Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy and leave the smart people on the planet and send the others away on a trip and telling them that the world is going to end and we will follow them in another spacecraft.

Related Links: Geek Revolution

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Note Made on 5-15-2000 3:38 PM EST
This was my third node that I wrote. I wanted to make a good node and I thought I did. Well I have edited this node and added more links. Note about this node I wrote this only a month ago and during a teen angst/geek angst fit. I do hate high school but I am less then 200 school days away from getting out of high school for good. (About 385 Earth days) I hope to make an impact as big as some of the most famous people on the planet.

A major reason why high school sucks is the people running it. Who the hell wants to be a teacher anymore? Until this year, every teacher was over 49 (two were 50). This year 3 were hired right out of college, and they are some of the best teachers there. However, they are the exception. Three others were hired. They are incompetant, quite simply. The old teachers are generally burnt out. The administration is even worse, both ignored and stupid.

I am a senior and a brain. I can walk out of a class without an excuse. Yet I still have to show. Idiots and jocks run amok. Learning is frowned upon. Independant thought is rude. Incompetance is expected. High school doesn't educate, it merely keeps teenagers off the streets.

reply to Segnbora-t(Thank you for the compliment BTW)

You make several good points. All teachers over 50 certainly are not burnt out. My favorite teachers are over 50 and in some cases 60. However, the older the teachers got, the more likely they were to be burnt out, and the less in common they had with their students.

I was unclear with my second point. What I was trying to complain about was how easy high school is. I take only honor or AP courses, yet I get by with no effort. If they want to make it that easy, just let me stay home and sleep. Otherwise give me some meat, instead of predigested prunes.

Woundweavr said: "Until this year, every teacher was over 49 (two were 50)." And? All teachers who've reached that age must be unskilled or burnt out? Several of the best teachers I ever had were nearing retirement age -- they'd lasted that long because they enjoyed teaching and they were good at it. Those who burn out often do it much earlier. (I'm 27, incidentally, so it's not like I'm defending my own age group here.)

"I am a senior and a brain. I can walk out of a class without an excuse. Yet I still have to show." I'm sure you're quite intelligent -- I know I've always liked your writeups. But I teach university classes, and encounter a lot of students who coasted on their brains through high school and didn't think they needed to show up for class, now that they were out of high school and could get away with it. Boy, were they often surprised when they got their midterm exam grades back!

(Added after reading Woundweavr's reply: Yes, I remember the same situation in high school where stuff didn't require much effort in some of my classes. However, classmates in the same Honors and IB classes were struggling -- some of my best friends were jealous of how little time I spent doing homework compared to them. It may be just that it's impossible to teach a class that will be on everybody's level, depressing as that thought is.)

SB5 said: "Another reason is that high school is also full of immature, disobediant, adolescent, imbeciles. The third reason that comes to mind is that there are a few teachers that actually care for their students, and even treat their students with respect." Gee, you wonder why the teachers don't respect those "immature, disobedient, adolescent imbeciles"? I like my job, I care about teaching my subject, and I respect the students I have who have a mature attitude toward the work they need to do, but so many don't, even though they're in university and supposed to be adults. It's hard to respect someone who sits in your class paying no attention or who you don't recognize because they only showed up once a semester. Instructors try to do our jobs and some students put us down for it because they happen not to think the subject will ever be useful to them. The students who care often don't speak up. (And just think, I have the worst of them filtered out because they didn't go on to college. Imagine how frustrating teaching high school must be!)

High school sucks because of all the BS students have to go through. I got lucky, others did not.

The freshman year at the "school" i goto is nothing more then a waste of time. It is incredibly hard for students to take a real science class, because they are supposed to take a wheel-style introduction to the sciences class. It is nothing more then 8th grade science class reiterated. Freshman PE? First of there are PE requirements to begin with, however that is another wheel style class. The Computer Applications^H^H^H^HOffice 97 class is such a joke. But at least you can test out of that relativly easily. (The teacher hands you the Word section of the final, if you so better then 70%, you pass. I got a 90%. I use word to type essays, i had never heard of half the crap on that test.) Freshman English. Hah. Hahaha. Please stop the laughter, i think i'm coughing up a lung. That is english on about a 5th grade level. It makes sure you can read and write standard 5 paragraph essays. Lets see how far a 5 paragraph essay gets you in life, epsecially a 600 word one. I don't think they ever teach kids how to write extended college style essays until AP Composition. A hard class to advance to unless you take summer school. I don't think kids get a social sciences class.

Now realize, i think you can test out of 2 of those classes. However, the test for the Office 97 class, isn't until after second semester starts. Which basically means, you sign up for Computer Apps, test out of it, then whine at your counselor until it changes your schuedual. At least at our school they are a buncha morons. Now, don't get me started on how our school "Doesn't accept high school classes taught in the 8th grade" or "No, we don't count Honours credits from 9th grade". I transfered in before 10th grade. I had 8 Honours classes incoming. I was lucky to have Spanish 1-H and Algebra 1-H count, as i took them in 8th grade, but they were on my transcripts as freshman year, and no one needs to be the wiser. Ah yes, and transfer codes apparently can't be created. I Don't know how the original ones were made. But new ones can't be added. I have a Phsycial World of Science, Honours, credit, for Physics Honours.Physical World is the class you take if you outright fail that freshman wheel science. Now, a senior level physics class is different from 8th grade science, continued...errr..physical world. Talk about killing morale.

I had to draw blood to get past BASIC and Office 97 classes and straight into AP Computer Science. Which was by far my easiest course. Not that it wasn't hard, but when you get something the first time, and stay ontop of the work, its a very easy course. Talk about weeding out the weaker. Those kids mentioned in fozzy's writeup dropped real quick like. It was a college course, the professor basically told the kids if they weren't up to snuff to leave. There was no dumbing down. Life was good. Then i got a pink slip, sending me to my counselor. (Damn, i wasn't being fired.) She tryed to remove me from the class. I didn't have another basic computer science class. My big mistake was probably telling her that there were no computer science classes offered directly by the high school. BASIC is not a programming language and Office 97 is not computer science. I was well on my way into the Office class until i got a teacher reccomendation, which he had to give in person. There was an understanding met. If i didn't pass, teacher got to firebomb my house.

I could go on for hours. Sorry for the rant, i'm just a tad ticked at some of the crap i've gone through at this school. Stupidity should be painful. (It's what people read on the back of my bike helmet as i dodge and weave through traffic :)

My father told me why high school is so horrible, and also gave me the key to surviving it. He said:

"The traits you need to succeed in high school are the opposite of the traits you need to succeed as an adult."

This is true. Creativity, inquisitiveness, and fortitude in the face of criticism are vital to being a happy and successful adult. They're also guaranteed to get you in trouble with the administration and the students alike.

To survive, just keep a sense of perspective. You'll get through high school eventually; even if you're have to check off the 720 days of high school in a book, remember that you'll get through them and have the opportunity to get into a better environment.

One other piece of advice: take the time to get good grades. There are real financial rewards for a good GPA—it's a pain in the ass to jump through the hoops for the grade, but it will pay off in the long run. (This is coming from someone who graduated with a 2.8 GPA, the minimum accepted by the college I wanted to go to). Plus, you'll find that you'll eventually have to jump through hoops in order to get something you actually want, and it's good to practice on your high school report card, which you can screw up without permanently losing the chance to get where you want to go.