Advice for Incoming Freshmen by Ella Kazazic

Even after just one year as a freshman at Hathaway Brown, I find that I have changed a lot. Now I am able to get through each day without having to check my schedule to see what class I have next, and I even find myself carrying around a heavy backpack with everything I need for the day without forgetting anything. Adjusting to HB life and even high school life in general was hard, and reflecting back on the school year, I can see how adapting to a school that was so much different from my old one was really difficult for me. There are a lot of things that I wish somebody had told me before I started high school, so I’m sharing some of them with you.

Here are three pieces of advice for upcoming freshmen.

1. Stay organized.

Throughout the year, I didn’t put much effort into organization because I thought that I would figure everything out once final exams came. Yet now, just as finals are about to begin, I barely even know where to start! Make sure your notes aren’t scattered and try to at least know where specific documents for certain topics are. It’ll make your life a whole lot easier.

2. Don’t be afraid of joining a club.

Signing up for clubs was scary for me because I thought that all clubs were such a huge time commitment. If you’re thinking about signing up for a club, you might as well just do it. It’s not like you can’t leave the club if you decide you don’t like it! If you don’t join, you might regret it later, so just join whichever clubs you have any interest in.

3. Get sleep.

This is a pretty generic piece of advice, but it has a large impact on your life. I find that many freshmen stay up extremely late for no reason at all, or just so that they can say that they stayed up until a certain time. Don’t do that. Just go to sleep and you’ll feel a lot better. Especially when you’re stressed about something like an upcoming test, if you go to sleep, you’ll be a lot more rested and you might be a bit less stressed out when you wake up.

HB is a hard school, but it is extremely rewarding, so it’s important to stay on top of your work and take advantage of all the opportunities that the school gives you. Good luck!