Big transitions can be rough and challenging, especially when you are unprepared. You are forced to adapt to your new way of life and keep going. A notable transition that happened to me was going to three different schools in three years. It was a tumultuous time, and I had to start from scratch with each new school.

I started kindergarten at a private school called Summers-Knoll School. It is a small K-Eight school, focused on project and place-based learning, And I stayed there until seventh grade. I practically spent half of my life in those walls. I learned many things and made many memories in my years there. By the time I was done, I knew every corner of the school, knew almost everybody’s name and I really appreciated the numerous projects we did. We did science projects, acted out a play with hand puppets and we learned to preserve food. It is safe to say that I am still very attached to the school. I had never had another schooling experience, never seen the public schools, but I was about to.

My parents thought that the school was getting a bit too small after some complications and some students leaving. They didn’t want me to go from four people in seventh and eighth grade (yes, there really were only four people) to over 800. So they had me put in a bigger but similar public school, Ann Arbor Open. At first, I was pretty disappointed by this transition. I had spent so long being familiar with Summers-Knoll, and I would not get to graduate from it. It felt like a year’s worth of fun projects and friends being stolen from me at the time. So I started over and tried to learn the layout of the school, make some friends and learn. It was hard and a bit awkward, but I eventually got the hang of the first transition. I ended up doing well at school, made some good friends and I made the most of my circumstances and enjoyed my time there. I graduated eighth grade from Ann Arbor Open in the same school year I joined.

Now it was time for high school. But because I skipped fifth grade, I would be heading into ninth grade younger than most. My parents were open to some schools like Community, but they thought that some others might not be best for me at my current state. They thought I’d do great academically, but maybe not as much socially. I didn’t really want to have to go through yet another school for eighth grade again, so my parents homeschooled me. It was all looking normal, but then Community called right before the second semester to let us know I was off the waitlist if I wanted to join mid-year.

It was a hard decision to make. The main struggle was the fact that CHS called maybe at most two weeks before the second semester was supposed to start. If I joined mid-year, it would be even more awkward than eighth grade for the first year. If I didn’t join, I could miss out on an opportunity that might not come again next year and miss out on this incredible school. I was eventually convinced that Community would be a good fit for me and I could do very well there. So I decided to go to this school mid-year. This school environment is very similar to the ones I have gone to previously, just bigger and obviously more mature. I made it through the third semester of high school, and so far, I only have good things to say about CHS, and I hope to find more.

Here I am now, still adapting and learning about this school as I settle in for the next four years. High school always felt like such a big step for me, but this was a lot different than what I was expecting. Now that I look back on it, it has been an interesting time with all the different schools. But I was able to adapt to all the changes that came with these transitions in my life, and I think it all turned out well in the end. I got an education, had a fun and familiar time at my old school and ended up in the high school I always wanted to go to.