Rockridge High School
Taylor Ridge, Illinois
Teacher: Barbara Downey
Rite of Passage for the Next Generation
By Brooke Hartman
Grade 12
Does a rite of passage mean just one time of proving yourself to be
worthy of being called an adult? Not to me. I see today’s rite of passage
as all the years called adolescence, the years when you start to learn who you are, and
try to find your place in life. However, I think that adolescence today could be
changed for the better. I think teens have become confused as to what they are
really supposed to be doing at this stage in their life.
Teens do need change. Today, they aren’t given a role that puts them in a place of
importance to their community. They are shoved away every day behind closed doors to sit
in a desk for eight hours and learn about the real world out of a book. So, because
of this inferior feeling they try to grab adult’s attention and assume adult type
roles every day. However, the teen’s chosen roles have become the
problem. Teens today see it as normal to drink under age, smoke under age, and
engage in sexual activity outside of marriage. This could be due to the fact previously
stated: they are trying to assume adult responsibilities so they can feel important in,
and a part of, the active, adult world. I see examples of this every day.
Teens sit home and drink while their parents may be at work or even sitting in the living
room, and they smoke at public restaurants without ever being questioned of their age.
However, maybe all the blame shouldn’t be placed on the teens. Parents are to
blame also. We read an article about parents who threw teens a drinking party.
This is just relaying the message that this is acceptable and just a part of life.
Also, they are recognizing the activity as a part of the adult world. Parents need to grow
up too. They need to become role models for the teens so they have someone to teach
them about life.
On the other hand, some parents are trying to make a difference and
change for the better. Many of my friends are involved in their local youth
group. It is headed by a couple of their dads. They are always organizing get
togethers and mission projects. It has become quite popular and has attracted many
more students to join. Their mission projects were extremely successful. After
returning from their trip I heard numerous stories about the feeling they got when they
met the people they were helping. Also students at my school are involved in co-op
education and apprenticeships at the Arsenal. I believe this is a wonderful
opportunity. This is giving the students more time to explore the work force while
still active in school. They are able to observe and be a part of the community, and still
interact with their peers on a daily basis. Our chapter of the National Honor
Society is a charity based organization. We feed the homeless, sponsor blood drives,
and clean up our adopted highway. After participating in these activities I feel
good that I, as a teen, am able to make a difference in someone else’s life.
While this is a wonderful effort, it isn’t enough. More students, if not all of
them, should be involved in this. My plan for the future is this: interactive
education. I believe the solution is to let teens see that what they are learning in
the classroom is useful to the adult world. School systems could implant a
curriculum that was more interactive with the community. If a government course is
offered, then after learning the rules and guidelines they should see a local government
meeting, talk to representatives, and be involved in decision making, and asked their
opinion on some important issues. My class was given a chance last year to job
shadow for one day. This was a wonderful opportunity, but it was only one day.
Students could possibly be allowed to job shadow once a month at different
companies. There is a big world out there. A course to teach students about
careers and helping them choose a college major could also be extremely helpful.
Students don’t know what they want to do because they don’t know what is out
there. Teachers and parents should be helping these students find their interests
and get them in a program that they want to learn about. Also, I think it would be a
good idea to require community service. If teens were given the chance to do more
than serve one meal at a homeless shelter, then maybe our communities would be a little
safer and better.
Obviously there is enough of a need to change the role teens play in
our community. I don’t think that we need to develop a new rite of passage for
our youth. I believe we need to nurture what we already have and continue to change
our school’s curriculum to fit the changing needs of today’s world. We need to
pay more attention to our children and give them what they need to be successful in the
working world. Adolescence is the perfect rite of passage as long as we fit it to
the needs of each generation.
Answers To Questions
1. Margaret Mead’s quote is reminiscent of a current
Army commercial by using the phrase “becoming less than what they might
be”. The commercialused the slogan “Be all you can be.”
2. I believe the type of language spoken in the home, familial pressures on the
child, misconceptions about race and color, and artificially separating children from a
knowledge of birth, love, and death are still important in the lives of American youth
today. I would agree that the degree of the importance of these issues has varied
and probably will continue to vary in future generations.
3. Yes. I agree that culture is whatever man makes it. I think this is
proven true by the numerous cultures that exist today. If every person believed in
the same things then there would be no variations. Culture is literally defined as,
“ the act of developing the intellectual and moral faculties especially by
education.”
4. 2. Margaret Mead states directly that she “was not advocating a return
to the primitive”; however, she would want people to have “more control over the
civilizing process itself.”
5. I believe Susan’s speech was very accurate and I think that it is sad that a
child has pointed this out and not an adult. No, we don’t always want to
recognize what is going on because it has become so widely accepted in our
generation. However, I believe we need parents to be role models and to enforce
boundaries.
6. I positively know of three of my peers drinking rum and coke at Saturday
detention out of Coke cans, I know of many students who have used different methods to get
out of drug tests, and I know of numerous students who have driven home after drinking at
a friend’s house.
7. I think that the black teenager did the right thing by ignoring the
harassment. People do want to see him over react and maybe this self-fulfilling
prophecy will vanish if others take his example.
8. Yes, I think this would be a tremendous relief to only have to go to class and
learn. I would not have to worry about what others thought or be overly careful of
when I stated my opinions. I think I would be happy if academics were presented in
an exciting way but I believe there is much to benefit from being a co-ed classroom.
9. I agree that “Schools are like prisons because they don’t teach you how
to live” and “People in school are dulled by the remoteness to the real
world”. Schools keep the students in an enclosed building away from the outside
world all day. We are taught out of books and never shown the relevance of these studies to real life situations. I would
really enjoy community-based learning. I think that hands on experience would make
students feel they were preparing for real life situations.
10. I think it is especially true that adults can lecture kids to their heart’s
content but if they don’t care what they think, there is no relationship, or the kids
think the adults are ignorant of their lives the kids won’t listen. If I do not
respect a person then I will be more apt to shrug off their advice. If a person has
shown me that they are respectable and we share a relationship, I will probably consider
their advice and more than likely follow it.