Ask HN: How to make the most of your high school experience?
As a current high school junior, I'm just curious what advice you would give to your former self.
What did you do right in high school? What would you have changed?
What did you do right in high school? What would you have changed?
I started running and lifting and worked off my man boobs, which helped get me some dates, which is what I was going for, so that was cool.
I let myself read texts that weren't assigned by, or endorsed by, the fundamentalist religion into which I was born, which in retrospect was practically life-giving.
> What would you have changed?
I'd need to talk in terms of various universes to even start on this one, maybe.
It's not like I'd move from one rail to another. It's more like, I'd like one universe to try this irreversible conversation with mom & dad and then face the consequences, and another universe to try the goth scene, running away from home, and some irreversible decisions, etc.
The cool thing is, at mid-life you can start to realize you can travel back into time somewhat. It's complex but basically doable in a way that a lot of people never really take advantage of.
Regardless, regrets are an amazing tool in any case as you move forward, I wrote a blog about this a while back. Hopefully you're still young enough mentally to let yourself make tons of mistakes, which should keep your executive processes sharp.
https://www.friendlyskies.net/maybe/regrets-a-powerful-plann...
Good luck with the rest of HS!
At this age, there are some consequences that you're insulated from. Things that might otherwise destroy some adults' reputations or cause them legal troubles can simply become funny (and/or cringey) memories. I'm not gonna advise a teenager to go do drugs, but I also won't pretend that I've ever regretted the occasional underage drinking I did at the same age; if anything, I more regret having been a bit of a stick-in-the-mud. Just don't touch tobacco or anything harder than alcohol/cannabis, don't do anything while driving, and don't be stupid.
Takeaway here I guess is to just put some effort into having a social life, because in a few years it's going to be harder and the world will be less tolerant of mistakes.
Things I did right: Taking a high load of advanced/AP/post-AP classes. My favorites of those were probably computer science, network administration, Latin, and history/government. I learned a ton, and the GPA weighting meant that I could have a >4.0 GPA on paper while being kind of a lazy student in reality, which helped get me into a much more prestigious university than I deserved. Working at a camp in Maine over the summers was the best thing I ever did.
Things I did wrong: Dropping my athletic extracurriculars (soccer and martial arts) and not taking an interest in my health/fitness; if I could start over, I would get into lifting, running, and keto years earlier. Leaning too hard into my introversion and turning down social opportunities (and girls) without good reasons. Being insensitive or a jerk sometimes, especially for the sake of a "joke". Not taking a gap year before college; I wasn't honest with myself and tried to power through burnout, setting myself up for a bad time. Not wearing sunblock or a daily SPF moisturizer, especially in summer; fuck around with stellar radiation and find out. Not hodling when BTC was at $0.76.
As an aside, I feel terrible for this generation growing up in a social media panopticon (and in the pandemic, but that's another matter). If I were a parent today, I would teach my kids to be very conservative about what they post publicly. Think back to the dumbest thing you've ever said — now imagine it taken out of context, with the least charitable possible interpretation, decades after the fact. A lot of Zoomers are gonna have a real hard time running for political office.
I also humbly suggest that you don't actively try to have a "high school" experience. The media we consume tends to romanticise it (lots of firsts etc) but most of it is inconsequential and can be harmful. Just be decent and don't let peer pressure stop you from doing what you want to do. Your grades matter, they are what decide your first steps out of school and into the "real world" but they don't matter much after that.
What would I have changed? I would have tried to be less cynical and angry at everything at nothing.
- the most important subject is math, master it to the T
- learn to code, choose one language and go deep in it, something you can start making money with in 2 years ideally even before college (recommended: go lang, javascript, python, java...)
- girls (make a goal to not be without a gf for more than 1 month, ask out new person every day if you have to)
- gym (get into weight lifting and sprinting/swimming).. aim for consistency
- apply for best colleges even if they are financially out of reach lot of them are actually free if your parents don't make 100k+
- engage in public speaking, even try making podcast/youtube/tiktoks (being influencer isn't just cringe thing to do, it's highly lucrative and sets you apart in most fields)
- invest all extra money in index funds, seriously, lot of upside in 10 years.
- it's ok to drop out of college and come back when more motivated or do part time college, esp true if college isn't like top 10 college
Priority list: Friends > Girls > Math > Gym/Sports > Coding > Public Speaking > Investment > Other HS Studies
Do what makes you happy.
I think the exception is if you're some kind of elite athlete. You don't get much of a chance to make up for key formative years in which you need to be training if you want any realistic shot at the pros and certainly a scholarship to a D1 school if it's a sport in the NCAA. Other than that, academically, getting into an Ivy only matters if you're trying to be an MBA or get into finance, and whatever else you might do in terms of honors and AP classes at best saves you a year of college in what's likely to be a 90 year life.
College itself matters a lot more. Don't pick a useless major unless your parents are rich and you're going to get a great job no matter what. Don't saddle yourself with a bunch of debt. Still don't get arrested and don't have kids until you're graduated and have a job in a more or less "permanent" city you're gonna stay in. College is when my regrets started, but even there, the crappy and stupid things I did were easily overcome by the time my 20s were over.
The English class I ended up in was such a drag, not intellectually stimulating at all.
Also, turns out that clear communication (writing and presentations) is super valuable in technical fields, and scientists spend a lot of time writing
Besides that, have fun go to parties try out hobbies and just generally do whatever you feel like. I personally wish I had spent more time learning an instrument at that age.
When you count how many hours you get for each class in a semester (or tri or whatever division of the school year you have), you realize that if you skip any one class, you miss out on a big chunk and can get behind really fast. Then you end up asking the questions everyone already knows the answer to, and it's all quite distracting and frustrating for everyone around.
So if you must take a day or days off, try to catch up as soon as you can before your return. Otherwise you might have a hard time understanding what the subsequent classes you attend are even talking about. That advice obviously doesn't count for bird courses. (Make sure you always have at least one bird course!!! It's a way to get easy marks with something that's at least interesting and fun.)
If you skip a class to hang out with friends, then any subsequent hardships are yours to own.
Also... you have to find a way to at least somewhat enjoy classes with material you can't stand. For example, I really hated History because it dwelled on WWII and specific names and dates, when there were other things that are more interesting and not so deflating as reading walls of text and watching old black and white movies with that old-timey documentary accent and wobbly sound track. I barely skimmed by because I just couldn't hack it. The only saving grace was that my uncle was a captain in the air force, and he could tell the same stories in a way that were far more captivating than those depressing school films. If it wasn't for quizzing the crap out of him every time we visited, I would not have passed.
BONUS: My teacher was lenient on me because she knew I was trying to get this stuff down even when not in class. As much as I hated the class, I really respected the teacher for her understanding.
Ideally, you should have good friends that you stay in touch with after you graduate. But don’t beat yourself up if you don’t.
Ideally, you would take extra classes in the area(s) that interest you, and would hopefully help prepare you for college, or whatever you want to be your next step in life. But don’t beat yourself up if you haven’t.
Lots of people have done not much in high school, and yet gone on to be wonderful contributing members of society.
And lots of people who have “done all the right things” haven’t amounted to much after they left.
In my case, since eighth grade (1980), I knew I wanted to “play with computers”, which turned into programming computers, which lead me to take programming classes and extra math classes in high school (graduated in 1984), which turned into getting a degree in computer science (1989), which turned into a career of being a professional System Adminstrator and later a DevOps guy.
These days, I think kids get started with computers at a much younger age, and some of them are actually programming computers before they get to 10.
If you already know what you want to do with the rest of your life, that’s great! You should follow that at your earliest opportunity.
But if not, don’t stress out about it — high school and college are the times in many people’s lives when they start figuring out what they want to do. Some people take a decade or more to get all the way through getting a college degree, because they haven’t figured out yet what they want to do.
Most of my cousins do not have college degrees.
But one was a top mechanic for Otis elevators, and taught elevator maintenance to hundreds and maybe even thousands of other Otis personnel, in addition to being flown around the world to help them solve some of their stickiest problems. He may not have a degree, but he’s still a really smart guy.
Another was a race car driver in his own right in the World of Outlaw sprint car series, as well as being chief mechanic for Sammy Swindell, including the brief time that Sammy was trying to break into NASCAR. He may not have a degree, but I still think he’s the smartest guy I’ve ever known.
You don’t have to have a college degree to be a really smart person, or to have a really wonderful and fulfilling life.
Although I do think it might help. ;)