When walking through the hallways of school do you hear phrases such as “Nerd Alert” or “Swirly”? Are little freshmen getting shoved into lockers? Is the quarterback dating the cheer captain? All of these stereotypes show up in movies, but is this the reality of high school?
Everyone knows and loves the classic high school movies. Popular ones include “The Breakfast Club,” “Mean Girls,” “The DUFF,” “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off,” and all three “High School Musicals,”. These movies set big expectations for what high school is supposed to be like, when in reality it is far from what’s shown on the screens.
In “Mean Girls,” Regina George is the queen bee. No one dares disrespect her or her minions. She is the ruler of the school: If she doesn’t talk to you, don’t talk to her.
In the “High School Musical” movies, star basketball player Troy Bolton doubles as the lead role in the school play, while also balancing a relationship and his grades. He is pushed to the limit but manages to do it all.
In “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off,” main character Ferris fakes sick and spends the entire day hanging out with his friends. He manages to hack the school attendance system to show he was present and be back in bed before his parents came home.
Class clowns and relationships are romanticized within all these films. People are always laughing at the teacher, students are hanging out at each other’s lockers, and flyers are being passed around for weekend parties.
All of these movies set unrealistic presentations of what high school feels like. What the movies fail to focus on is the actual workload that goes along with being a student. “Coming into high school my expectations were based on all the movies I watched growing up. Yet after spending almost a year in the building, the reality did not meet my expectations. We didn’t even have a real homecoming dance this year and I can not recall the last time everyone dressed up for spirit days. I feel as if everyone is always stressed about an upcoming quiz or exam, making school almost impossible to enjoy,” freshman Hannah Chen said.
One element that correlates to real life is the different groups of students referred to as cliques. Every high school has band kids, nerds, athletes, jocks, popular kids and theater kids. But are students from different cliques rude to each other? “I definitely think there are different groups within the school but they aren’t how I would have imagined. For one, barely anyone sits in the cafeteria for lunch so there aren’t distinct tables for certain cliques, and I don’t see people getting bullied by each other on the regular,” sophomore Gryphon Breckstein said.
Students who have grown up within the county tend to feel a sense of disappointment once they experience high school, however foreign exchange student Ebba Liese has had an experience of a lifetime. “My high school experience has been better than I could have imagined and dreamed of. It’s been so fun and I have made so many everlasting memories. For me, American high school actually feels a lot like the movies, especially our school with the red, white, and blue colors, the lockers in the hallways, and even the tables in the classrooms. It reminds me of “High School Musical.” Another thing that feels like the movies is the food they serve in the cafeteria, and then of course all the football games, pep rallies, basketball games, and the best thing was when I was on the winter cheerleading team, that made it feel a lot like a movie. Standing there watching the crowd cheer really enlightened the experience. A lot of things surprised me but a major one was how big a deal sports were to all the students, sometimes they even felt more important than classes, but I loved that. My expectations were met and for me the high school experience has been just like the movies,” Liese said.
