The term sophomore means more than just being in the 10th grade. In Greek, it means that a person is wise, but also foolish. Young teens think they are wise in understanding how the world works, but they are foolish when choosing the right path to take.

Having grown up in a different state’s school system, and then seeing the lifestyle in Maryland, I see sophomore attitudes around me that drive me crazy. In short, don’t know how good you have it. Stop complaining and take advantage of this time in school.

My past is full of experiences you can’t imagine. I would never have thought that going to school in sixth grade would have me watching one of my classmates being escorted by the police officers to jail.

By the beginning of sixth grade, everyone knew who had the drugs in the school, and the dealers didn’t even try to hide anything.  Selling drugs in the school was as easy as giving out gum to friends.

Fighting in school was like watching WWE. It wasn’t a punch or a kick here and there. Most fights ended with an arrest. I witnessed drug deals, knife fights.

I witnessed a lot of kids who didn’t care. (Or, maybe they couldn’t care because their lives were so unstable.)

I learned that it is very hard to be more than the people around me. For 11 years I watched girls ruin their futures by messing around and getting pregnant. I watched guys getting arrested for drugs and fighting.  The excuse was that our school system was horrible and kids never cared about their future. That’s just it.  It’s an excuse, not an answer.

Walking the halls of LHS and seeing some students’ apathy it irritates me because, unlike those who can’t, you can!

There is no secret to who does and sells drugs or to who parties and gets around; the student body knows who those people are. What’s great here is that those people are the minority, not the majority.  We all know how to walk away.

If those people continue down that same path, then my past experiences is in their near future.