A Message to All High School Seniors

My buddy Grant Smith and me on our last day of high school.

If you're a high school senior, right now is a huge time. You have to make a college decision within the next couple weeks, you only have a few weeks left of school, and you probably have a lot of questions on your mind. What I want to tell you is, it's okay to not have answers to those questions right now. A year ago I was in the same spot as a lot of you are. I want to talk about why you don't have to worry, and what kind of advice I can give to you all, whether you're a senior right now, a junior or an underclassman, I think what I have to say may be important for you to hear.

The first thing I want to say is don't take this time for granted. I know this is very cliche and you probably hear it everyday of your lives, but it is true. The second this lesson actually hit me was when things changed for me. From the start of junior year I simply could not wait to start college. I wanted to rush through senior year and never look back. But at some point I realized how this was the last time I would ever be at high school. It was actually after my last night league game. I realized, yes I will play basketball again, but I won't be playing with the same team or the same friends. My team was never significantly good and every year we would walk out of the gyms after a close first round playoff loss and think about how there was always next year. And then I realized there was no next year. This was the end of that part of my story at New Trier. And then I looked around and realized everything around me was coming to an end. It made me a lot more grateful and happy to be where I was. Why rush through the year when this is my last year here? Make the most of your time, regardless of how you've felt about your time in high school. You might have hated it all or you might have loved it, I don't know your circumstances. But you're only a senior in high school once. Try to be as positive as you can and make the most of this situation. You can enjoy college in a few short months when you get there, but enjoy high school while it's there because you're gonna miss it. No matter how much you love college, you will have days where you think about and miss high school. You'll miss seeing your friends and the fun times you had. Make the most of your time, try new things and make new memories.  For me one of my favorite parts of senior year was riding bouncy balls to school with 19 of my friends.

Now that I got that cliche out of the way, I can talk about something that might not be talked about as much. It's okay to feel sad. A lot is changing in your life, and there is a lot of uncertainty. For me my graduation day was one of my most emotional days because it was so hard for me to accept the change that was coming in my life. I knew I was going to miss these days where we're all together. And I do miss this, but it is okay to feel sad about it. You will eventually grow and leaving high school isn't the end of the world. You'll see your friends every Thanksgiving/winter/summer break. It is okay and completely normal to be sad. It might seem like no one is sad about leaving, but a lot of people are and many won't admit it. It's perfectly fine to feel sad about it and talk to your friends. You will work through it just like any other major change in your life.

The next thing I want to say is about making a decision and trying to find out your future. As I said before right now you have a lot of questions and not a lot of answers. Right now there's a lot of pressure on you to know where you want to go to college, what you want to major in and what you want to do for a living. It's okay if you don't know yet. And maybe you think you know, but then things change and you change your mind. That's okay too. The way I look at college is, a period of time after high school where you learn, grow, and mature and set yourself up for the real world. How you go about that is different for all people. For me it was to drive four hours to Taylor University, spend a night there and realize that it wasn't for me. It wasn't the right fit for me. I then did a class at Oakton, followed by taking this semester off. In that time I've learned so much about life and myself and what I want to do: which right now is this; writing. I might not have figured that out if I had stayed at Taylor. Being here has been a great experience for me and I think I've started to grow a lot.

This brings me to my next point: community college is okay. Something that is a shame is the way community college is viewed around The North Shore. People make constant jokes about Oakton. In actuality, Oakton is a great place if you don't know what to do. You can get some of your gen-ed requirements out of the way and you save a ton of money. Really, you save so much money at community college. Go there for a year or two and then transfer to a university. Don't let other people's perception of community college affect whether or not you go there. For me, I was ashamed to go there at first. But my friends were incredibly supportive of me and it's been great. Like I talked about before this year off has been so good for me. Read some of my past blogs if you want to see what I'm learning. Community college isn't for everyone, and some are better off going straight to school. However, community college is a viable option that I think is overlooked and needs to stop being looked down on.

If you are making a college decision and need to make a decision in the next couple weeks, relax and take your time. Don't stress it too much. If you go to a school and it isn't the right fit you can always transfer out. Now, you want to go to where you think you'll stick around, but it's okay to transfer. Transferring doesn't automatically mean quitting.

Try to be as positive as you can when starting college. This is something wrong that I did. Try to be as optimistic as you can when you start at school. Like I said that it's okay to be sad, don't worry too much. College is a great time in your life and I don't want it to sound like it's bad. This year has been amazing for me. My friends at school are very happy and love it. Eventually you will settle in and enjoy yourself. Work hard and do your best, no matter what you are doing.

Try to gain as much knowledge as you can to equip you in your field as you move forward in life. Look at college in that light. As for now, make the most of your time in high school. I hope you enjoyed this blog. If you liked it, I'd appreciate it if you could share it with your friends on Facebook. Let me know what you think on the comments below, or on my Facebook fan page. As always, have a great day and thank you for reading!

Best of luck to the Class of 2013!