What is the True High School Experience?
Image courtesy of Milton Academy
By ELLA O’HANLON ‘21
At the end of a high school movie, you often see the final scene coming to a close with a dramatic movement of a tassel from the left to the right side as the students graduate and move on to the next chapter in their lives. Throughout these high school movies, you also typically see friends talking and laughing at their lockers, worrying about who will receive prom king or queen, or hanging out at weekly Friday night football games under the lights. Many students think of these moments as part of the classic and typical high school experience, one which Milton Academy does not provide. Though Milton replaces these lost aspects with so many other rewarding educational and social opportunities, do teachers’ high expectations for students to act as adults and their encouragement of student-teacher equality take away from an authentic high school experience?
Milton prides itself on its famous Harkness table, around which the teacher sits with students, encouraging discussion-based classes, rather than lectures. The teachers’ sitting side by side with students and discussing as if just another member of the class gives the sense that the teacher and the students are equal. Yes, I can admit that I have enjoyed the encouragement of participation; however, the feeling of student-teacher equality that Milton fosters not only inaccurately portrays real-world relationships, but it also puts pressure on students to act as adults instead of their own age.
A few of my teachers throughout the past few years at Milton have allowed their students to call them by their first names, as if another student. Such attempts at student-teacher equality give students the impression that they have as much power as their teachers; this power dynamic is an inaccurate representation of how the real world works. Once students graduate from Milton, they will most likely attend a college and then find a job. A power difference exists between bosses and employees. Bosses will expect to be treated as more than a mere equal– they will expect to be treated with respect as an authority figure. The Milton culture allows students to talk to teachers as if they are simply other students, so some of the respect in the way students outside of Milton normally speak to teachers–a respect which teaches kids how to deal with authority figures– is lost. This subconscious insubordination will not be accepted in the real world when students graduate and move onto their next stages in life.
Additionally, when students are treated as adults, they suddenly face all the stresses of adults, which can lead to many mental health issues. Students already worry about what career paths they will take and how they will become successful. In being treated like adults, we are taught to worry more about our future than who will be prom king or queen, and because we are working toward that future, we do not have time to hang out at weekly Friday night football games. Students who are treated as adults will feel as though they should act as an adult at all points in their lives. Now, on top of the stress of grades and college, students have to worry about real life issues, adding even more stress into their lives. Rather than living the expected life of a highschooler, Milton students are overwhelmed with stress due to the elevated expectations for them to act as adults.
Don’t get me wrong, the fact that Milton Academy encourages teacher-student equality is highly beneficial to a certain extent. However, I believe that because of the belief that students and teachers have an equal level of power, students are expected to act as something they are not– adults– leading to both an inaccurate representation of the real world and an unnecessary level of stress, ultimately taking away students’ ability to live the classic highschool experience as teenagers.