Did you care about high school? Then and now...

[TheShizNo1]

Re: Did you care about high school? Then and now...



I didn't give a **** lol. I don't say that w/ some idiotic pride. I say it laughing at the dumb *** that I was then. I'm a good test taker and that did more harm than good. I just didn't try. I found every short cut and easy way out of learning. If it required anything more than looking at it for more than ten minutes, it wasn't getting done. I wouldn't even take books home half the time. I was dragging a 1.8 GPA into my senior year. I realized that plan I had for college was now in doubt. I held no lower than a 3.0 my senior year and still got more rejection letters than acceptance letters. At the time I couldn't understand this. I'd think, "What the hell, I'm smart! Don't they see the year I'm having? " What an idiot lol. Had it not been for football, I'm pretty sure I wouldn't have had the college opportunities I did.

This is how math went for me in high school:

Freshman Year: Algebra 1 - It's a computer class. You do problems on a computer. A friend and I found out how to get the answers out of the program. All we had to do was reach a certain chapter by a certain date and we'd maintain an A.

Sophomore Year: Geometry (2 different teachers)/Informal Geometry - If you can tell, I wasn't ready to admit I didn't know **** early in the year. It occurred to me when reading that "I" word in front of Geometry on my report card, that I may have a problem. It also hit me hard once I heard my classmates read out loud.

Junior Year: Algebra 2 - FAIL. I capitalized all of that because it wasn't even close.

Senior Year: Algebra 2 - I was placed in math 1. I said no, to go to college I need Algebra 2. After my counselor threw her tissue away that she used to wipe the tears caused by laughter, she switched classes for me. I made up my mind to bust my *** to pass that class. Once class started, I realized the fact that I didn't know **** still played a rather large factor. I sat behind two girls who I'd known for a while. One I had even dated. I flirted my *** off that year and they showed me every answer for every test. The teacher was an Ohio fan, so I'd bull**** w/ him too. I watched him show me a 77 in the grade book and then show me the grade he was going to put on my report card: B.


Guess who can't help his students when they bring him anything above pre-algebra?


It was for the better though. I can talk to dumb asses at school about how they're going down a slippery slope and throwing opportunities away and actually be speaking from experience.

Damn, I didn't mean to type that much.

[Lieutenant Dan]

Re: Did you care about high school? Then and now...

Shiz, what do you teach again?

That was a great story by the way. I laughed at the bit with the counselor, LOL.

[TheShizNo1]

Shiz, what do you teach again?

That was a great story by the way. I laughed at the bit with the counselor, LOL.

I don't technically teach. I do teach a class preparing seniors for college. But my actual job is an Intervention Specialist. I'm responsible for certain kid's IEP's and generally helping slow kids stay afloat.

Id rather just say teacher lol. That's the shortest I can make that explanation.

[Lieutenant Dan]

I understand what you do...thats cool. My son was in IEP for a learning disability.

Thanks for what you do for those kids.

[ubernoob]

Re: Did you care about high school? Then and now...

I was kinda in the same boat as Shiz for high school with the not trying too much. I did take a lot of AP classes, though (Lit, Calc, US History, etc.) I was a phenomenal test taker (routinely at or near the top for every test) but my knowing that did me in as a student. Our school wasn't a big school (we had 4 public and at least 2 private in the city) and my graduating class was a small class for our school at around 350 or so.

All my teachers, for better or worse, knew me. The usual bell curve of teachers. I had one teacher that I absolutely loved though and I had her for Bio/AP Bio. Smartest lady I have ever met, about all different subjects. She didn't really put up with too much BS, but you could have some fun with her. There was a group of 4 or 5 of us that played cards in her class every day, one of whom faked a stroke in front of her on the stairs. I actually convinced her during our finals time (in AP class, I didn't take the AP test so our final for those not taking it was a previous version of the AP test) to turn on March Madness on the little TV she had stashed on the shelves. I couldn't fully win that battle because she said it had to be on mute, but little victories. Another teacher of mine (who was a very nice lady, but scatterbrained and a bad/clueless teacher) hunted me down and pulled me out of AP Bio for skipping her class 4 times a week. That was a running joke for the rest of the year. Plenty of good memories about HS, no real bad memories at all.

I didn't get good grades (I finished somewhere in the middle with a GPA somewhere between 2.5-2.7, don't remember what exactly) but got accepted into college because of a 28 GPA. Didn't care about that year of school, failed out. Still got accepted to a different university the next year. Didn't care, dropped out. Joined the USMC Infantry on a whim for fun. Hated every minute of it, but wouldn't change that time for the world. Learned a hell of a lot more about myself and the world than I ever would have in college.

Going back to college (mostly to get paid for going to school, I couldn't care less about the actual degree) some time in the future. Not worried about "making bank." I have a beautiful fiance who has the awesome career of nursing, already make more than enough to pay for a mortgage in VA disability (though we are still renting until we get other bills, and her large [100k+] school loan under more control) and know that I made the right decisions in my life.

Much of that started in high school. I could game the system there for the grades, but had a few awesome teachers that were more about the life lessons out of things than the actual book knowledge/standardized test BS. In that manner, yes I did care about high school.

Worrying about grades, which college I could go to to indebt myself to lenders and the general drama (that I didn't have thankfully) that is normally associated with high school? No thanks, I'll pass. 80% of these degrees aren't worth the paper they are printed on, considering that's probably the amount of jobs that need skilled labor vs actual learned labor. Neither here nor there though.

To all the high school kids: Don't sweat the small things. It doesn't matter what you do in life if you aren't happy, a college degree or high paying job doesn't change that.

[NDAlum]

Re: Did you care about high school? Then and now...

I was the star athlete, had great grades, popular, and had one of the best looking girls in school. I was friends with everyone and the teachers all loved me. I don't think I had a single person in the school that I was not on good terms with. Overall my experience was amazing and I will try to hit up our 10-year reunion this fall if I can.

High school wasn't my life though. I chose sports over going to my graduation and then went 10 hours away to take the best opportunity available. I have a few friends from HS I still keep in touch with.

I see several of friends from HS via Facebook who still have the same core of friends from 10 years ago. I applaud them for sticking it out. I would love to have a few of my close HS friends near where I live and still be involved in their lives.

[CMH]

I didn't. HS was pretty easy for me. It baffled me how people struggled so much in it. I played sports as well. I didn't have to try hard to get decent grades. My only expectations for myself were to get nothing lower than Bs, because I did want to go to college. I didn't study, I did 90% of my homework on the school bus or in the hallway before class started. I slept through a lot of classes. I graduated with about a 3.76 I think.

Got into college. Those same poor habits kicked me in the butt. I never learned how to effectively study or manage my time. I think my final GPA in college was around a 2.7 or 2.8. I struggled with holding myself accountable and there was no one else there to hold me accountable either. Paid the price really limiting my opportunities, spent about 5 months unemployed after graduating.

But I'm fairly content with where I've landed for now. I could be making much more money elsewhere but I'm doing alright.

This is pretty much my life here from the grades to the expectations and not being accountable in college.

Except I never did homework in the halls or train unless it was reading assignments.


Sent from my mobile device.

[VDusen04]

Re: Did you care about high school? Then and now...

It was for the better though. I can talk to dumb asses at school about how they're going down a slippery slope and throwing opportunities away and actually be speaking from experience.

I think I mentioned this earlier in the thread, but that's what I'm dealing with right now with my younger brother. I tried to be forward with him on my personal school missteps and was very clear for a long time of the pitfalls to watch out for and avoid, but he hit just about every one of them anyway. He plays the, "I do well on tests though!" card too, but it's resulted in a 2.2 GPA through his junior year. I understand kids will make their own decisions and don't automatically listen to everything we say, but I admit it's disheartening to watch.

Recently, he's developed a goal of opening his own business. There's a business program at his high school he can take and he told me there was a two year community college program for opening a business and that's where his interest now rests. I'm glad to see there's a hint of passion and direction there. But as a result, he's said he sees no point in learning things that he feels won't have any use for him opening a business later and that is why he has ceased working in school.

I've given most of the speeches you'd expect - how it's important to leave all options open, that school can be just as much about developing good habits and learning to make yourself do things you don't want to but have to, how opening a business would require knowing a lot of things from a lot of different subjects, etc. I'm just not sure anything is sticking. It actually kind of makes me think twice about having kids. I've spent a lot of my life trying to set great examples and showing these guys the right way, and I'm hoping it still pays off, but man, it's tough to go through right now.

[TheShizNo1]

Re: Did you care about high school? Then and now...

Dealing w/ something similar w/ my younger brother lol. Then I remember I was a stubborn *** and sometimes had to learn things the hard way. Sometimes life can be the best teacher.

This is pretty much my life here from the grades to the expectations and not being accountable in college.

Except I never did homework in the halls or train unless it was reading assignments.


Sent from my mobile device.

It's weird to me that college was fairly easy to me. I didn't have hardly any good habits going into college. I had to learn how to study for the classes I couldn't ace tests in. I had to make myself pay attention most of the fifty minutes instead of doodling or zoning out (never mastered this one). My main issue in college was discipline. There weren't many finals or projects that I worried about.

[BDKiiing]

Re: Did you care about high school? Then and now...

I didn't care at all about high school while I was in high school. I just wanted to play baseball. I barely had a 2.0 through my first year and a half, and was told by my buddy's mom who happened to be the secretary in the guidance office, that I wasn't going to get into college with that. So I turned it around and threw down a 3.6 second semester of junior year, and a 4.0 all of senior year. Barely limping into college.

In retrospect, I hate myself for it. We had 5 valedictorians for my graduation class, since we didn't have weighted classes. And now I realize how easy high school was, and how I could have been up there. But oh well.

[J-Clutch1]

Re: Did you care about high school? Then and now...

Wish I cared more about the AP Calc exam I took today.

Though I must point out: There aren't enough good teachers.

[Husker_OS]

Re: Did you care about high school? Then and now...

Went to a public high school with roughly 1,800 students. That's where the positive ends.

Each semester we had 4 classes that lasted 96 agonizing minutes each. I hated it with a passion. Never studied since it was a given I would go to the University of Alabama and I knew my ACT score would get me in without question. I probably had the lowest high school GPA of anyone in my high school that went to a 4-year college(if I had to guess 75 total, we had tons go to community college then transfer to Alabama or Auburn) and if my ACT score had been lower by just 1 who knows what would have happened. Worked out for the best I guess.

The downside to never studying and having the GPA I did had to be my parents. They never quit lecturing me about grades and it made my high school experience so much worse. At one point I had aspirations of going to Nebraska but decided against it once I looked at their communications school compared to Alabama's.

I haven't spoken to anyone from my high school since my freshman year of college. No use for people who stay in one town their entire lives and never really leave.

If I could do one year over again, that would definitely be sophomore year of college. Dated a girl for 3 months that year and wasted so many parties on that bitch.

[XtremeDunkz]

Re: Did you care about high school? Then and now...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=bQ2VAV3HYdU

This about sums up most of my teachers in high school

[TheShizNo1]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature...&v=bQ2VAV3HYdU

This about sums up most of my teachers in high school

So awesome in so many ways. Gotta love the "Your welcome".

[st67]

Re: Did you care about high school? Then and now...

Did I care? No - I'm honestly surprised I even graduated. I spent most of my time being late to class, playing basketball during lunch and after school and skipping classes. Obviously I did enough studying and homework to pass, but barely. I was and still am a very, very lazy student. I don't care about learning things that I've no interest in - which is what school is.

Do I wish I got better grades? No. My final year I got almost straight A's (the school I was at) and got a scholarship to a University. Which never did much for me, because at the time I had no idea what I wanted to do (that was my main problem - almost nothing really motivated me). Now there are a few things I could think of that I'd like to have done - but then I just had no clue, or didn't think I was smart enough to do.

Do I wish I'd learned more and paid more attention in general? Yes - but grades don't really mean ****. They mean you've studied enough and done well enough on the homework; I've met some really stupid people who got really good grades, and I've met some really intelligent people who never graduated high school.