Being the New Student – School Week

Being the new student is hard. Since I have moved a couple of times, I have had to go to new schools where I did not know a single person multiple times.

I think that when you just come from another school that is very similar and not too far away, it is not too bad. I am always very nervous and anxious for the first week or so, but then it gets better very fast. What is really important (I think) is to be yourself. If you are a shy introverted person, do not pretend to be the life of every party. You will not be able to keep that facade up for a long time. It might work for a couple of weeks, but then it is too hard to pretend. I have previously done that, but always realized that it does not work very well. People will like you just the way you are. Maybe not everyone, but some people are enough.

Changing schools is a lot harder if you have moved to another country or change between public and private schools. You do not really speak the language, you do not know how the whole school system really works and if you go to a public school after going to a private school everyone thinks you are very rich and look at you as “the private school girl (or boy)” or the other way round. I feel like, the more different the schools are, the longer it takes until you are accepted into a class. So don’t worry if you do not have any friends after a week! It is going to get better. When I first moved to Switzerland, I went to a private school. Even though I did not have a lot of problems with the language (everyone spoke high German (the German you speak in Germany) or English, I had a lot of trouble finding new friends. It took more that a week until people even started talking to me. Whatever happens, do not change your personality and your ideals. For example I do not drink or smoke. At the school I went to however everyone was drinking and smoking. I did not agree with that so I still did not drink anything. This probably made finding friends even harder, but now I am very happy I stayed true to myself.

After half a year in private school, I decided to change to public school. I still had not found very close friends and I did not like that the curriculum was very easy. That change was probably even harder though. Everyone at public school speaks Swiss German which is quite different from normal German. I had difficulties understanding what they said and even now (after 2 years in public school) cannot speak it. Also everyone thought I was one of those dumb, rich girls that went to the private school I went to. The students there were nicer and more open, but for a very long time people still said things like “you have enough money anyway” and stuff like that. That really annoyed me, but it got better. If other students say things like that and they annoy you, just tell them. Kindly ask them to stop, because it hurts you. And after a long while the comments got less and less, and now I am quite happy at public school. So I know I do not really have a lot of advice I can give you, but just hang in there. It is going to get better.

Peer Pressure – School Week

We believe that whenever you are in a group with a lot of peers, there will be pressure to fit in. We feel that the most pressure from your peer mostly applies in three areas: your appearance (your clothes, makeup, hair and weight), what you eat and your grades.

 

Appearance

We both find that your appearance should be your personal choice, and not influenced by other people. Everyone talking about how you look makes us really self-conscious and insecure. When I (Caroline) first started wearing proper makeup to school everyone asked me about it and kind of made fun of me. It was not really mean, but at that moment it really felt like it. It took a lot of courage to finally do what I wanted to do and wear makeup to school and I already felt a bit insecure. Then the teasing was too much and I really hated it. But in the end it was not the end of the world and I survived, but if you see someone wearing something new or trying a new look, that person might not be very confident so please do not make it a big deal. The same goes for hair and nails. My hair is really heavy, so even if I take the time in the morning to put it up into a nice ponytail or something like that, at least after the second or third lesson my head starts to hurt and I have to take it down. Then I get hot or it just annoys me, so I put it into a messy bun again. Obviously, then my hair is not perfect, but honestly, I do not care. But it really annoys me when then someone comes up to me and tells me that I have hair sticking out of my bun.

Another thing, people often judge you about, is your weight. I (Helena) have always been quite skinny and I can’t put on weight. That might sound like a dream to some people, but others thought that I had an eating disorder and since I was not very self-confident this didn’t help me. I think you should never make fun of people because of their weight and it does not matter if they are skinny or curvy! Most girls I know are not perfectly happy with their body and it is very difficult to lose or to put on weight. So just don’t make fun of it because I think this is a very personal thing and I (I don’t know how others feel about it) don’t want to talk about my body with other people. Because I started to accept it as it is and then other people don’t have to make me feel insecure again. I just don’t need people like this in my life.

 

Food

We think food is a very sensitive topic. In our opinion everyone should be able to eat what he or she wants. Maybe you want to eat healthy, maybe you don’t. And both are totally fine and should not be a topic of a general discussion. Friends should support you in every decision that you make (as long as it is ok for your body).

Two years ago, I (Caroline) did not feel like eating a lot. So every day at lunch I would just eat a couple of bites and leave the rest on my plate. And every single day my friends discussed how much, respectively how little I ate. I absolutely hated that. It made me feel weird for not wanting to eat and did not help me even the slightest bit. I do not think that they meant to do any harm; they were probably just concerned about me. But if you are worried about a friend, just ask them whether they are ok, don’t comment on their eating habits or try to force them to eat more (or less). I was not feeling great at that time and them picking on it made it worse. What you eat should be your decision until it is endangering your health, and even then you should try to speak to the person when they are not eating or ask a parent or teacher.

I (Helena) eat quite much and not very healthy food an am still very slim. People who did not know me very well automatically thought that I was so skinny because I didn’t eat much (comprehensible) but I assured them that I ate enough and a lot of fast food but they did not believe me. So some of them obliged me to eat at least one big spoon of nutella everyday and this just made me angry. I really think that what and how much you eat are your own decisions and not the business of others.

 

Grades

Since I (Caroline) have very good grades, I often get called a “genius” or “gifted” by classmates. I hate that so much. Nothing gives you the right to call someone a genius based on his or her grades (based on anything really). You would not call someone who does not do well a fool would you? I feel very pressured by this, because I feel like they’d realize that I am not actually that smart if I ever have a bad grade. Since I still feel so pressured by all of this I can’t really give any advice. Just try not to listen to it too much. Just work for yourselves and not for others.

Another time when I think people should just shut up (sorry) is when you talk about exams. After every single exam, I feel like I totally messed it up. Thinking about it rationally, I know that I probably haven’t, but I still feel that way. So everyone is talking about how well or badly they did and every time someone asked me how it went I used to just answer honestly and said that I think I did really rubbish. And every single time the answer was that I should just be quiet because I would have a six anyway. And every time that made me feel so much worse, because not only was I worried because I wanted to have a good grade, but also because everyone else seemed to be sure that I’d done well so I would also disappoint everyone else. I always get very scared before we get back a test. Whatever happens, it can never be good. If I want to make myself happy, I have to have a really good grade. But if I get that, then everyone tells me I am a genius again and I hate that. So if you tell other students how smart or dumb they are, please just stop because it might really affect that person.

I don’t really have very good advice for that, but my best advice is to just not make a big deal out of your grades. Just look at your exam and then put it in your bag before anyone really notices. So you’ll never be known as the idiot or the genius and there is a lot less pressure on you.

Competition – School Week

In school, everything is designed to be comparable. You are in a class with people that are in a similar stage in all of your subjects, you are tested with the same exams, and your results then measured in the same note scale. Your performance and ability is turned into a number. Sometimes it can feel as if you are just a number compared to other numbers.

To make it through school (and later life we assume) there is one thing you have to accept: There is always someone who is better than you. It will happen all the time, so if you don’t accept it, you will always struggle. Don’t compare yourself to others. Don’t try to be better than your classmates, try to be better than you’ve been before. GRADES DO NOT MEASURE YOUR INTELLIGENCE! And even if they did, being intelligent does not make you a better person.

As we both do pretty well in school, there are always stupid people (I’d really like to swear here, but it does not seem appropriate, so just think about the word you want to use in your head) that get really excited and rub it in your face that they are better than you. Especially when you are already putting very much pressure on yourself this can be very hard to deal with. You are already beating yourself up in your head about your grade while trying not to show it because no one would understand anyway (because usually our grades were still good, just not perfect) and then someone comes and laughs at you because they are better than you. They are probably just insecure themselves and try to feel good about themselves for once too. They however, do not think about what that means to another person. They probably do not realize that being laughed at for being worse still hurts, even if your grade is not very bad.

Personally, I (Caroline) hate that everyone always knows my grades and use me as a scale to measure their performance. If it really bothers you either directly talk to your classmates or tell a teacher. I just told some of my friends once and I think that they understand me better now. I won’t tell it my whole class, but my friends already act differently and this helps me. So this might help you too.

Gossiping – School Week

This is just our personal opinion and you are of course allowed to have your own opinion. We think every teen girl on this planet gossips. We do not think that gossiping in general is a bad thing. However, it has to stay within some limits. Whenever you say something bad about someone, think about what kind of consequences it could have for the person. For example, if you say that your classmate’s trousers are the most unflattering things on this planet, that’s okay. I mean, admit it, that is just fun and no matter how cruel that sounds, it always lifts my mood. But as soon as it starts to become very personal, and it starts spreading rumours about that person, you have to stop. It is not fair to tell lies about people just to get attention. Don’t go around telling everyone that your classmate has a crush on someone else if they don’t (even if they do and they have confided in you firstly it is not your place to tell others and secondly that is just misusing their trust in you). That could really hurt the person and you might lose a friend or at least their trust forever.

So gossip if you want to, but stay within certain bounds and everything will be fine. Most of all don’t exploit the trust of your friends.

Pressure – School Week

Our first theme will be pressure since it is our biggest problem in school. Even though we both do quite well in school, we have experienced kinds of pressure about our academic performance.

I (Helena) have mostly been pressured by my family and sometimes still am. My parents always told me that they were disappointed in me whenever I had a grade lower than 5. I used to fake the signature underneath my exams so that I would not have to tell my parents about a bad grade. Fortunately, that was not the case too often, and nowadays my parents accept lower grades a bit more. I think that even if your parents tell you that your grades are not good enough; do not put even more pressure on yourself. Bad grades do happen – even if your parents tell you that they shouldn’t. Try finding the reason why you had a bad grade and try to change it. Maybe you did not feel very good on the day of the test, or you put so much pressure on yourself that you just could not focus, then it is not your fault. Accept the bad grade and maybe try to tell your parents the reason. If however you do constantly really bad because you do not study for tests, then you should think about getting a tutor and change that. But we think that whatever you do, you should do it for you and your education, not for your parents.

Thankfully, I (Caroline) have never been pressured by my family. They were (and still are) very understanding. However, I put a lot of pressure on myself. My family always tried to tell me that bad grades don’t matter, they even took me out for dinner to “celebrate” an occasional bad grade, because they wanted to make sure that they don’t care about my grades and that I should not do that too much either. Unfortunately, I am still struggling with this. I beat myself up about grades that aren’t even really bad and put even more pressure on myself at the next exam. But I realize that this does not make a lot of sense and that my grades are more than fine. I think that that is an important step, because even if you can’t immediately change your behaviour and accept a grade that is not perfect, knowing that I do well enough has really helped me. Also, when I put less pressure on myself, I can study so much better and I am also less nervous during tests or exams so I can focus so much better. Basically the less pressure I put on myself the better I do at school. So if you are struggling with this, try to remember that you are sabotaging yourself and this might make your grades worse.

Last year there were some weeks where the pressure I put on myself was too much. I was scared of even thinking about school, let alone going to school. I spent my evenings crying over my books, trying to remember all the things we had to know for several exams. My grades got worse, which made the pressure even more. I did not think I could do it anymore. I then decided to talk to my math teacher, with whom I have a very good relationship. He was very understanding and tried to help me any possible way. He also recommended talking to the school counsellor. Even though I did not talk to the counsellor after all, I started to feel a lot better. So if you think you cannot do it on your own, talk to someone! Whether it is your parents, your friends, a teacher or a counsellor, it might help!