“Ames, Iowa, High School” by photolibrarian is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0
If someone told 11-year-old me three years ago that I would be going into my sophomore year of high school, in a new state, without masks, and with the fear of COVID-19 steadily dwindling, I would have never believed them. During the pandemic, there was so much uncertainty, about what exactly the illness entails, when it would end, and if the world would ever go back to normal. However, somehow, school has returned to an adapted version of its former edition. And thus, my family, and the world, have experienced almost many changes to our lives as the World Health Organization COVID policies have since the start of the pandemic.
When my family decided to move, during the pandemic, it seemed like a difficult task, especially knowing no one in Iowa except various corn fields. Although more people started to move during the pandemic than in past years, it still seemed to be a daunting challenge, and felt like so much change in an era filled with precariousness and worldwide strife. Yet, against all odds, my family and I managed to move 500 miles, alone, in the middle of a global emergency.
Along with that, we, as a society, have been biologically fearless, braving our new world, scared of new illness among uncertainty and doubt, and continuing to try to build routines that were forgotten and to instill systems as they were invented. As vaccines and treatments were still being innovated and pioneered there was a plethora of unknowns. And still, the population of the world decided to press on anyway, because throughout the world, there was a sense of collaboration in valiant attempts to make the public as safe as possible, for the time being.
It is this principle that, in my eyes, shapes high school. The idea being terrified, but somehow continuing on, with support from individuals going through very similar and starkly different circumstances, and being open to scary, harrowing things that can end up being an enriching adventure. This is especially evident in 2023, after the pandemic and global state of emergency has ended, and we now have to adapt to an altered state of the world, one rife with fear, pain, and loss, but one also with hope and perseverance. High school is like that sometimes, being scared of tests, expectations, the future, and more, but persisting forward. High school in 2023 is all about the “somehow;” knowing that somehow we will make it through the unpredictable and somehow look towards the future.
The introduction paragraph was really good and captivated me right away, the wording of the whole essay was very good! One comment and suggestion I have is to tie in high school throughout. You talked a lot about COVID-19 but didn’t mention what school is really like now until the very end.