As a graduating senior, I’m not going to college next year. This decision to not go straight to more years of education is a result of moving to a few different schools in my elementary and middle school years. Not in a way where I’ve moved so much that I’m sick of school, but in a way that I know that going to college right away isn’t something that I feel the need to do.
On top of that, I’m not really sure what I want to pursue in the future yet, so taking at least a year off to go somewhere completely different is what I want to do.
I’ve attended five different schools in my educational career so far. Two elementary schools, two middle schools and one high school, but I’ve lived in Palo Alto my entire life.
Each school has given me a different educational experience ranging from a more religious experience, to public school, back to a private and online education during the COVID-19 pandemic and finally, attending Palo Alto High School for four years.
Attending my first years of elementary school at Gideon Hausner Jewish Day School helped build my connection to a more secular version of Judaism and my Israeli culture. I gained an incredible community of both, which was significantly hard for me to leave.
After third grade, my parents decided to move my older brother and I to the local public schools in our neighborhood. I was confused as to why. Although religion was never a focus for my family at home, I had been at a traditional school for a few years and didn’t understand the sudden change that my parents wanted.
This change was fueled by my parent’s extinguished belief in religion. As my parents began to think about their values and beliefs as well as being influenced by Objectivist philosopher Ayn Rand, they wanted to raise my brothers and I to value rational and free thinking.
With their change of heart, my parents wanted us kids to receive an education that was not centered on religion, but one that would allow my brothers and I to eventually decide how to think without the pressure of religion all around us.
Eventually I came to understand their decision to move me to a public school away from a religon. I attended the last two years of elementary school and first year of middle school at the local schools. In the middle sixth grade, COVID-19 hit and along with it worldwide isolation, resulting in school through Zoom.
The second half of sixth grade was unproductive and meaningless for me. Assignments were never clear, and the isolation prevented social interaction.
Both my parents and I decided that I wasn’t gaining anything from the public online school, and judging by the fact that isolation was going to last for at least another year, it would be more valuable for me to go to a school that was specifically designed for online learning but still kept the social aspect.
The next middle school that I began at gave me a whole new perspective on how I could be educated. The school, Academy of Thought and Industry (ATI) was no conventional experience.
I learned with students from all over the United States and had the opportunity to visit friends and teachers from the state of Washington to Arizona or when they came to visit Palo Alto.
Although the majority of the school day consisted of learning on Zoom with teachers and students, every Wednesday we would end the day at noon, and then as part of school, each student would choose a passion project to work on for three hours.
Because of the project, as an eighth grader I became an intern at the local Guidepost Montessori preschool. This internship gave me the opportunity to work with small children and also learn the Montessori method for education — approaching education for children and students in a way that they could pursue their natural interests and passions to develop a foundation for their lifetime of learning.
Lifelong relationships and skills have developed from just attending an online school for two years of middle school that I’ll never forget.
Returning back to public school for high school wasn’t an easy transition. But it was important for me to expand my social life, which I felt going back to public school would help me achieve a larger social circle. In my freshman year, I struggled with friendship and anxiety. I felt a bit of a shock coming back to public school after two years of online school, but found that my skills to think critically were honed to be sharp and useful. Many days I find myself questioning topics that are discussed by teachers, students and my friends around me.
My experience with going to so many different schools has taught me that I don’t need to be perfect, that I don’t need to be good at everything. It has taught me that I have and will continue building the skills I need in my day-to-day life to succeed and be happy.
In fact I credit much of my decision to not go to college or university straight after high school to the fact that I was able to encounter different versions of teaching and learning. Switching different schools has shown me that I can find joy and knowledge anywhere I go, and new strategies of learning and working.
I get to face an amazing future ahead of me that I can build for myself and change whenever I want with my confidence and curiosity that I’ve learned to find and work for.
