High school Independence

            As a high school student we are pressured into figuring out what college we will go to, what career path we will choose, basically we need to figure out what our life will be at the age of 14-18.  But we still have to raise our hand to use the bathroom and most importantly we can’t leave the school during our lunch break to relax outside of a stressful school environment. How can we go from being so restrained from being independent to being thrown out into the real world expected to follow a career path? In the real world you can take your lunch break, leaving your job for around 45 minutes to get some coffee or get some food away from the stressful work environment you are in all day. We as high school students are babied wayyyyyy too much, and can’t even leave our cafeteria to go upstairs without being stopped and forced to stay there. Many students don’t even eat lunch because the school premade lunches are absolutely appalling, and to top it off we are forced to buy an apple or have a side of broccoli. This “healthy” side is usually just thrown out, so not only do most teens just not eat, if we do the majority of the lunch is thrown out, wasting a lot of food. If we could just leave the school for 45 minutes many students would eat food that is appealing to them.

            High school is the most stressful place there is for the normal teen, and if you ask adults today they would never want to be a high school student now with all the work, deadlines and restrictions we have today. 19.3 percent of high school students have seriously considered killing themselves, and 14.5 percent of high school students made actual plans for committing suicide, from being so stressed from school and from depression in many cases. If we could be granted the permission to leave just for our lunch break to de-stress and relax, maybe even just to go home and eat lunch, this high school student suicide rate could decrease.