2017 in Mariposa Schooling
The MCHS class of 2017 started in school 13 years ago. At the start nothing seemed to particularly stand out about this class, but little did everyone know that this class would one day completely change Mariposa schooling. Now, I have been following this class for all 13 years of its school life and have observed and participated in many of the events that have happened. This class was the last class to go on the Fresno Zoo trip on Amtrak in second grade, the last class to get to go to the middle school, the first class to be shoved back into the elementary schools for eighth grade, and the last class to avoid common core (for some of us that is). I suppose that you could ask just why is this class known for such bad behavior when they’ve been given so much? How does this class effect the school? Other classes? The answers are what I sought out to find.
When I first ventured out to find answers about the class of 2017 I started by getting into the heads of other members of the class. The first senior I interviewed was Bob Robinson. Bob Robinson has always had good grades and worked hard, but still takes pride in his senior class. However, when I asked him what the five characteristics of his class were he answered with, “Obnoxious, athletic, class spirited, not school spirited, and hard headed.” Adan Marquez described his class in one word by calling it “savage…” Weather or not these characteristics are accurate or not, one thing is for sure; the class clearly thinks highly of itself. Given that, Nathan Vereschagin, an expert at being a senior, loves his class, but still predicts that, “98% of the class will graduate but only about 75% will walk.” The class seems to, despite its high ego, not have much faith in itself as far as academics go. Finally I interviewed Nate Gorham and when he was asked how hard the class tries, he said, “I guess about a six.” What I realized from interviewing these students is that I now have a pretty good idea of how this class thinks and how they view themselves. However, to figure out just why they’re this way I still needed to dig deeper.
Next I took things a step further and spoke with some underclassmen at the high school who have and still do observe this senior class. The classes below the class of 2017 have a general reputation for being either “good” or “average” and tend to dislike 2017 as a whole. The first person I interviewed is a member of the class of 2018, which is the current junior class. She is also on track to be valedictorian, is a student athlete, and has traveled multiple countries out of America and its territories. When interviewed, Dawn Canapary answered the question of why the class of 2017 acted so much worse than hers, she answered, “there must have been something in the water when they were young that really messed them up.” Delainey Ronay, a sophomore, was the next to be interviewed, and she said her first thoughts on the class of 2017 was that they are “very loud idiots.” Taylor Jones reconfirmed the statement of them being very “loud.” Another interviewed person was Leo Kari, who had some quite strong opinions on the class two years ahead of his. I asked him to say how bad 2017 is on a scale of 1–10 and answered with, “a solid 9.” Is it possible that these underclassmen are all correct and that there is really nothing more to the class of 2017? Leo Kari sure seems to think so, along with various underclassmen, the class doesn’t even have any faith in itself. The remaining questions and logical answers are still yet to be revealed.
For this next passage to make sense, I’m going to need to give a brief background of how teachers in the past have reacted to 2017. In the beginning I believe that the students and teachers meshed very well. For example, I know that I never even had a warning in any class until 2nd grade where I got my first, and only, yellow card. However, as time went on there seemed to be more and more conflicts between students and staff. You may be thinking, “no big deal, every class has it’s clowns” but no, this was worse. This class continued to decline in good behavior the closer it came to being out of school. In fourth grade it was the beginning of foul language because the kids were now on the big kid playground. In sixth grade some of the kids began to vandalize school science equipment. Then in seventh grade (the last year of the middle school) the disobedience took a turn for the worst and kids began acting out towards the school authority even more. For example, when one teacher was moved positions and their new replacement was brought in the students acted so bad and disrespectful that the new teacher quit only a few weeks in. In just this year alone there were many problems with fights, objects being thrown at students and teachers, countless spitwads being shot, and some teachers even being yelled at by students. One group of boys even vandalized the entire bathroom on the last day of school and completely ruined it. In eighth grade it was back to the elementary schools where the kids had only two teachers for all of their classes. Back at woodland elementary some kids cussed out teachers, some kids were sent into the office in large groups of five or more, some deliberately lost P.E. equipment of the school’s, and some did even worse acts that can’t be disclosed in this article. Adan Marquez states that the M.E.S. kids were “almost just as bad, but not quite because we didn’t have the right people or opportunity. Once we all reunited in high school though, it all clashed and it was lit.” Once high school came the class immediately made its presence known by chanting “2017!!” extremely loud over even the seniors at the time. Sophomore year the class made one teacher quit her job before the year was over and made just about all of the others want to. Junior year one teacher who made plans to stay in Mariposa for multiple years ended up leaving shortly after the year was over, and one other teacher expressed with the class that some days they were so hurt that they ended up crying some days after school.
Finally this is it, senior year for the class of 2017, the year to end the chaos. Or should it be known as the year of the most chaos? So far the year has started off slow for the class of 2017 and it appears that they may have changed their ways or just stopped caring about their reputation because of a severe case of senioritis. When I asked one of the teachers how they thought the class was this year, Mr. Finney said he thinks this class is, “just fine.” What is it with this unexpected change? Why aren’t they acting out as they have in the past? Will they continue to be good? Perhaps the class has momentarily joined the good side but will end up going back to the dark side at the end, such as the opposite of what Anakin Skywalker did in Star Wars Episode VI. As a member, and ASB representative of this class, I actually hadn’t even noticed the transition of the class before writing this article. It turns out that my journey for answers actually just raised more questions about the class. This article may raise awareness to the class that they are possibly fading out, or (most likely) none of them will want to read this much. I will continue my research and be continuing to write more pieces on the class of 2017… “GIVE ‘ER HELL” -everyone from the class of 2017
