By Clyde Brittelle

Something that has been on the news a lot is the highschool application process. The main focus has been on how it should be altered, and the racial, societal, and economical aspects of the process. If you’re reading this article, I’ll assume you know at least the bare minimum about highschool applications in NYC, so I’ll spare you the basics. Instead, I’ll focus on how the process affected me and other eighth graders, and what I think should change about it. 

For me, the highschool process started in 7th grade. It wasn’t studying for a test, or writing essays, but grades. I needed to kick it into gear academically to be in Tier 1 (an average above 94.5) to increase my chances of getting accepted. Then, in the start of eighth grade, essays started to become a factor. Overall, I had to write six essays for highschool, ranging from 350-650 words. Amid the writing  and studying (I started preparing for the SSAT in the summer of 2023) I spent countless evenings going on tours of prospective highschools. Don’t get me wrong,  many of these tours excited me and I’m glad I was able to glimpse what life will be like as a ninth grader at my top choices for highschool. 

The highschool process was extremely challenging, but I was happy to have so many choices and avenues to a fun, fulfilling highschool experience. But others were not so happy about the time consuming nature of highschool applications. An anonymous eighth grader from BKI said that, “I lost a lot of sleep to {the highschool application process}” and that “there were so many essays, and they were all grueling”. While this was definitely a prevailing sentiment among my class, we also realized that it was preparing us for future applications. When asked if highschool apps prepared him for college, Dash (an eighth grader at BKI) said,” yes, definitely, and I’ve heard from many people that the NYC highschool applications are a lot harder than the college process”. Now, after showing the opinions eighth graders have on highschool applications, and its effects on us, I’ll move on to the changes that should be made. 

One of the most helpful aspects of highschool applications was the tours. They showed me what life as a student would be like at many prospective highschools, and heavily influenced my choices for ranking them. A problem was that some schools (like Stuyvesant) had their tours after the actual deadline for ranking or submitting applications. In my opinion, all schools, if they are providing tours, should be mandated to have those tours prior to the deadline for submitting your highschool rankings. It makes no sense for a highschool to have a tour, which is supposed to enlighten students on the day-to-day workings of the school, after the deadline for deciding which highschools you want to apply to. Because of this, I would like to make it mandatory for all highschools to schedule their tours before their deadline for submissions and rankings. As a student, this was the main thing I disliked about the current highschool application process. I have a neutral opinion on other aspects of the process, and see some even as beneficial in the long term because they prepare eighth graders for the time-consuming work of college applications. Overall, the highschool application process is an inevitably hard part of life as a kid in New York City. It is challenging, and takes a toll on you, but without it students wouldn’t have such an extensive field of schools to choose from. I believe that the highschool process is more beneficial than detrimental because it gives students much needed agency in deciding which school is the best, most healthy fit for them.