We have always wished at some point in our lives that we could either go back in time or travel to the future. We imagine what the good old days used to be like, or how much better it would be to grow up. The same situation applies for school, especially high school.

High school is a place where you make new friends, experience work harder than middle school, etc. Sometimes, people might want to travel back in time and experience the fun times they had during their time in high school. Or, they might want to go to the future and see how mature they have become, how annoying freshmen apparently are, etc.

Nevertheless, each grade has its own ups and downs, so it is up to you to decide which grade is the best.

Margareta Stern, junior, thinks that the best year is freshman year. She states that as a freshman you are new to this school and you’re experiencing and discovering new things in high school which makes  it more exciting. She adds on that it isn’t very challenging academically.

“Being a junior is definitely stressful with the college process, testing, knowing where you’re gonna end up and go to college, so definitely freshman year is better, academically and socially.”

Margareta thinks freshman year is better because everything is easier and brighter, while being a junior is very stressful.

Freshman Elias Swift also thinks being a freshman is the best, because the workload is lighter than other grades and you have more energy than the upperclassmen. His views are similar to those of Margareta’s.

“I think being a freshman is best because although I haven’t been in any other grades, as a freshman, you don’t get assigned as much work as the other and you still have that young energy in you.”

Freshmen have the most energy out of all the grades, since they are younger and have just come from middle school, so they might be a little more like little kids compared to the upperclassmen.

However, Elly Tuffey, freshman as well, thinks the opposite way. She thinks junior year is the best, because experiencing the pressure from college stuff and grades will push her forward.

She adds on that being a freshman is “overrated” because it is overwhelming since you have to get used to the new high school life.

Senior Ryohei Shima thinks senior year is the best. He thinks seniors have the most power and they have the strongest bonds with friends.

“You get all the privileges the iSchool gives you; you’re older, more mature, you get to mess around with teachers and do stupid stuff. The bonds are much stronger when you’re a senior, and it gets funnier.”

As you get older, the good thing might be that you get to fit in more, and actually feel like you are a part of it. The “stupid stuff” might be having more fun with friends or feeling like you’re the greatest of all the students, since you’re a senior and you might think everyone should look up to you.

Meanwhile, senior Chris Bell thinks sophomore year is the best.

“I think sophomores are the best because they are a happy medium stage of teenage adolescence. I think they all have  the youthful vigor of the younger classes but at the same time they have the sagacious maturity of and knowledge of the upperclassmen, so sophomore it is. Also I just like the word. So-pho-more.”

Seniors, according to Chris, are very cliquey and they don’t mess with each other as much as the lower grades. And, since they have already decided their “groups”, who they hang out with and who they don’t, even if they talk to different people in class, outside of school, they know who they “don’t want to be around”.

Meanwhile, on the survey sent out, out of the 29 students that answered it, 58.6% of the participants think senior year will be the best. 20.7% think junior year, and the votes for sophomore year and freshman year were both 10.3%.

Many of the subjects who said that senior year is the best said this  because seniors have more opportunities at school and they form stronger bonds with their friends and teachers.

This is true, regarding the fact that your connections with people become stronger as you spend more time together. Seniors have been in this school for four years, long enough to form many strong bonds.

Freshmen are usually seen as “annoying” from the upperclassmen. Freshman year comes right after middle school, so they are more energetic, and might look like annoying little siblings from the upperclassmen.

However, there are many benefits of being a freshman, too. They have the adrenaline that the sophomores, juniors and seniors lack because the workload in high school gets more stressful. You got to make new friends and experience new things during freshman year.

Ona final note, high school is where your dreams start to open its doors. It determines where you go in life-so it is very stressful-but working hard in high school will pay off when it comes to real life.

You will meet new people in high school just like you will do in the real world, and your work will be as tough (or even HARDER) when you get out to the real world. High school is like a simulation of what the real world is going to be like. Every grade provides you with the aspects that connect to your life as an adult. Some people might like the energy they had during freshman year, and some might like having the experience and power that the seniors have.