I had to share this. I am so grateful I have Sam as my friend. Life would be dull indeed without her.

Why is it that few people like school activities? Well, quite frankly, they aren’t very good/fun/interesting. We’re not two, and we’re tired of pinning tails on donkeys. Actually, since there seem to be so many animal rights activists and vegans out there, it’s probably just downright illegal. The point is, give us something interesting, something that is NOT run by the “popular kids."
Everyone knows that a school dance is like a huge convention for people who aren’t too terribly intelligent to get together and bump and grind and then run off to do the bunny thing in the back of somebody’s car
How about the school does something fun and safe? Give us scissors, strap pillows to us, throw us in a pit and tell us to stab each other. It’s a lot safer than a school dance, both socially and physically.
And you wonder why nobody intelligent comes. Maybe because nobody intelligent wants to get mugged in the parking lot because some girl was trying to make her boyfriend jealous by dancing with a nerdy guy. Maybe, just maybe, the intelligent social outcasts are tired of being wallflowers.The world will never know.
And yet, the world knows this: times are changing, things are happening, and Hilary Clinton might just be the first lady president. As the massive progress in technology leads us to be able to create better and better graphics to the point where actors may someday no longer be needed, beautiful, popular people are beginning to lose their stranglehold on the world and society as we know it.
Thus, modifications are required. Embrace your inner nerd, and think about those of us who might not be socially adept or “cool.” Pay less attention to the football team and look at art club and drama club and journalism and see what great people you have there.
Value them, they are the future leaders of America. While the gangsters and ‘cool’ people are off working at McDonald’s at the age of 21 trying to support their 3 children, the geeks and nerds are going to be at college getting law degrees and becoming doctors. I suggest you be nice to the ones becoming doctors.
Try having a gaming convention or a spelling bee or set up a few tables at a dance where kids less interested in breathing hormone-laced air can sit around and talk or play cards or scrabble.
Have some music that isn’t ‘new’. Play some stuff from the seventies, there’s a chance you might open eyes to a new horizon.
Above all, remember: Bill Gates is a nerd, and look how much money he’s got. Don’t you wish you had been nicer to him as a kid?

First off, I mostly agree.

Second:



My school's actually doing that one.

But the "drama club" example kind of contradicts what they said about actors, heh.

I was never one of the 'popular' kids in highschool and I went to two different ones. I had to move half-way through my senior year. That was kinda pissy... cause my second school wasn't nearly as big as the first and didn't have human anatomy and physiology offered as a course. I was in the art club in both schools.

But I loved school activitites at both schools... Pep rallys and bonfires were lots of fun cause of several reasons: 1) I enjoy rooting for the home team - whichever team that might be. 2) I enjoy any event which enourages me to yell a lot. and 3) I love crowds of people and events which involve crowds of people. This is especially true if said crowd of people are experiencing/displaying strong emotional reactions to something.

At my first highschool the art club was in the homecoming parade - strangely enough, our float always won the float contest each year! Imagine! So, homecoming was always fun. I never went with anyone and rarely got asked to dance by anyone - mostly cause everyone learned pretty quickly that I can't dance for nothin, but going to the dances was still fun cause of that whole crowd thing I enjoy.

I went solo to my Senior Prom at my second highschool and just hung out with my friends for the most part, though a few of my guy friends were sweet and asked me to dance despite my shocking lack of ability. The school sponsered after prom event was fun and was where I learned how to play roulette. I enjoyed getting dressed up fancy and looking at everyone else dressed up fancy.

I dunno... I always had fun at events. But then I'm easily amused I suppose.

And now I feel all nostalgia-y.

I whole heartedly agree. However, as a techogeek, I would like to point out there IS a difference between geeks and nerds. Both are great in their own right, but there is a difference.

Absolutely. I have forgotten which one I am , but I remember a difference.

My friend won't know the difference between the two, she's an utter ditz. Both she and I have had crappy a crappy middle school together and now we've got crappy high schools just not together. Noola, you're very lucky, methinks.

Which is why you recruit people and take over! It honestly works!

Or maybe its just because my grades known each other since like grade 7 at least. Weirdos.

We are the minority in our school. Dorks, geeks, nerds, and general smart people = small. Gangstas=large(not for her). Latino "gangstas"=large(her). Preps = extremely f-ing large. Goths/punks/skaterz=medium. Her school's a bit smaller than me...well I should say a lot smaller since we've got about 5K worth of people. :\\ stupid school's over crowded. So the possibility of taking over the school (which would be totally cool) is very small, unless the dorks, geeks, etc managed to actually gather together and pull the goths, punks, etc with them. We'd be able to match those gangstas and preps!

For me? I keep quiet and ignorant and still beat idiots and grades, I'm perfectly happy.

Though I agree 100% with what she wrote. My highschool (first year, yay!) isn't so bad, there's too much movement and seperation between classes for any huge gangs or anything to develop. So far, just small groups of friends.

Hate it how SGA (Student Government Association) elections are always, always just popularity contests. Makes it near impossible for me to get any "leadership" and make the colleges actually look at me.

Junior year and all the college prep sucks, by the way.

I think I threw up a little in my mouth.

I agree with what was said though. I got lucky in high school and fell into a group of people who basically didn't really give a hoot about about popularity or all that junk, but we weren't losers either, most everyone was really smart, etc. That group made high school bearable to me- no matter how weird I was, I'd fit right in Sadly most everyone scattered for college, and I'm confident I'll never find a group of friends nearly as awesome.

Don't feel bad about not getting into the SGA. Only way to get in is to trick people with blatant lying, and the SGA is pretty much just a puppet to the people who really make decisions. Lead a church project or something. I accidently did that once (I got tricked ) but it looked really good for things I applied to, and it helped me get into several things, though I can't say I remember what.

Maybe. Though I always look at it more like, who cares what anyone else thinks? I'm here to have fun and I'm gonna have it. So I do.

And yeah, your leadership activities don't HAVE to be in school for colleges to notice. In fact, if you can show leadership OUTSIDE the school, it can actually look better. Volunteer a lot in the community, blood-drives, habitat for humanity, neighborhood beautification, food drives, be a big brother/sister and things and volunteer to be a group leader in whatever activity you're volunteering for. That looks pretty darn impressive on a transcript - especially if it's not a one-off and you do it regularly.

Besides, think of all the good karma you'd earn with all that do-gooding!

I liked (love is a strong word) my high school. It was considered an "elite" one, 2nd/3rd best in the whole country, depending on the rating used. It focused on creating an atmosphere of patriotism AND open-mindedness.

There were quite a lot of Polish equivalent of preppies, but I can live with them. There were almost NO jocks, chavs, gangstas, popular kids or anything annoying of that kind.

This sounds like something I would've agreed with back in highschool. However, with the blessing of hindsight, I realize that it's just the bitter attempt at self-justification of an outsider looking in.

I know, I was there. In highschool, I had a few core friends, but I also hung out with many different groups of friends, the jocks/preps, the goths, the computer geeks, and the art/drama kids. But I never really fit in with any of them cause I was so independent. And just fyi, I was part of the art club, drama club, lacrosse team, and computer club.

Quite simply, that train of thought is flawed in that it stereotypes whole groups of people. Why can't a popular jock be smart and thereby lead to success? My brother dated the homecoming queen, was captain of the lacrosse team, and was very very popular. 5 years later when I got there, I still got props for simply being his little brother. Now, he is 27 and has already worked on wall street, been vice president of an I-banking firm, and is now attending Duke business school.

This carries over into college. My friends were very popular and good looking, I'd say. Now, they're attending law and medical schools around the country.

Don't fall into the trap wherein you'll believe that you're ever better than someone else because they're not like you. Popularity, appearance, and charisma are simply another facet of personality; it does not determine their total personality. Next time, before you judge a so-called 'popular kid', or any other one of those stereotypes, maybe you should try actually getting to know them first, you may be surprised by how nice, or how smart, or how caring they could be. At my old highschool, sure, there were some popular kids who really were . But there were also a lot who were among the nicest people in the world, and it really is too bad that I'm realizing this just now.

Seriously, this little essay is plagued by bitterness and bias. Everytime someone from the 'in' group is mentioned, they're portrayed as moronic, tyrranical, and conceited. Conversely, every time an 'outsider' is mentioned, they're labeled intelligent.


The only 'group' I can't justify are the 'gangstas'. That shit's just whack, yo. (Personally I'll admit my bias in this, simply because I've never met a 'gangsta' with more ambition/goals than where/when they're going to score their next bag of weed. I'm sure I'm wrong though, and some exist.)

Yanno...I don't get why you put people even into groups. I mean, doesn't that mindset actually make the walls between those "groups" higher, so to say? I have been to many schools in my life, trust me, but there never were any "groups". There were people who liked to hang out together, no matter what the other one dressed in/listened to/other shit. For example, I had a friend who only got A's, never went out and was just generally really silent. At the same time, me and him had friends (mind you, we hang out together all day long), who used to get to parties and get high/drunk/etc. Then we had a friend who used to listen to this alternative thing, dressed in many different colours and so on. By your defenitions, we wouldn't have been together at all. We'd have kicked each others butt, probably.
Guess that's just some weird thing going on in the minds of some people.

From an outside view though, I have to agree with Nico. ()

You understand Nico, that very few of the popular people within the schools we go to are actually intelligent? Very few, both of our schools' graduation percentage is about 35-45%. That's tiny compared to the 5k+ of people. My sister's graduating class was only 100-200 people out of the 1k+ of people in it. And yeah, we're bitter. We don't appreciate what the schools have been doing. I'm trying to get my school newspaper more involved with the entire student body but doing more student spotlights whether or not a person has done a OMFG!! deed. There's not much my friend can do in Del Rio due to the fact that they have no newspaper and even if she did, the possiblity of her getting hurt over stating her opinion is very high. It saddens me to see that this is happening in our schools, that you have to be popular to get recognizition and all that jazz. I'm happy that what happened to you and Noola was/is much better than what's happening to me and my friend.

There were only two groups of people at my school.

Nice people, and assholes. I avoided the second.

And I agree with Nico's post.

The funny thing is, people act like "popular" are so judgemental, etc., but I'm confident that almost -everyone- at some point has judged someone based on looks or interests before actually knowing that person.

And this is a random related rant, today on my way to my comp sci class I was walking behind a guy in my class who is, admittedly, very geeky looking, and a guy walking the other way looked at him and actually snickered. I wanted to punch him in the face so bad :|