Like most people, I came back from winter break with a new schedule. As I walked up the stairs and into room G215, my heart dropped. There was not a single person I was friends with in the entire room.
In fact, there wasn’t a single other girl in the room. Even the teacher was a guy. I was completely alone. I sat by myself, eyes locked on the door. A guy walked in . . . then another guy . . . and another guy. My biggest nightmare had come true: in a class full of 17 people, I was the only girl.
This isn’t a unique story. Many students have classes where their personality took a full 360 turn.
“In my science class last year, I became introverted. I tried to make new friends but no one would talk to me,” sophomore Xavier Johnson said.
In my math class, 6 out of the 22 people are girls. In my English class, 6 out of 19 people are guys. Classes are very rarely perfectly or even close to perfectly split. And, these classes leave lasting impacts on students.
“Whenever I’ve been in a class where I’m not friends with anyone or I’m not very close with them, I’m so sad,” freshman Melia Horner said. “It really sucks, and having no friends makes the class the worst of the day.”
The classes that aren’t “bad” (meaning, you do have friends in it) are always the most fun. But, contrary to popular adult belief, students CAN be productive with their friends.
“I dislike AP World, but since I have a friend in it, the class and the classwork is bearable because if I ever get confused, she can help me out.” sophomore Allie Vijit said.
Core class rosters, both the good ones and the bad ones, are chosen at random, but not by the counselors, as some (like me) thought.
“The computer [Powerschool] autofills based on the student’ requests and sometimes there’s really uneven classes,” counselor Meg Starman said.
PowerSchool is a computer program, so it obviously doesn’t know that Bill, Bob and Brad are best friends who hate Cam, Clark and Chad, so they absolutely cannot be put in a class. Instead, because PowerSchool is the way it is, it will put Bill and Bob in a class with Cam, and Brad with Clark and Chad.
“Having friends in a class is good, but you need to have social skills,” counselor Shay Ryan-Wright said. “One way to improve those skills is to branch out and meet new people.”
Even so, I still shiver when I remember my third hour English class where I sadly sat in my seat at the very front of the room, my one friend in the very back. I would watch the clock tick slowly, and listen to the laughter of those lucky enough to be sitting close to their friends in one ear, and depressing music in the other. Every time I walked into that room, my personality would shrink, my smile would fade and my participation would decrease. In my current English class, I walk in as myself and I walk out as myself. The subject didn’t change; just the roster.
“Rosters matter SO much more than the class,” sophomore McKenzie Dunn said. “Last year, there were like two or three other girls in my math class, and I had it at the end of the day. I can confidently say that experience has scarred me for life, and not because I hate math.”
The one saving grace for many students is time. After all, no class extends longer than two semesters!
“I had to redo Honors Algebra II, so I’m in a class with all sophomores. All I can say is, summer break can’t come fast enough,” junior Aashish Gopisetty said.
