As graduation approaches for RBHS seniors, many have begun to reflect on how their time at high school has prepared them for college.   

Senior Nourhan Balboula said she feels RBHS has provided her with many experiences that mimic a college experience. She said she knows what to expect in college thanks to her time here.

“Over the course of high school, teachers taught us things like taking notes, test strategies, study tips and how to find online resources for coursework and scholarships. Overall, these things are crucial skills any college student will later need to use, and they have personally helped me a lot,” Balboula said. “The freedom with responsibility part of Rock Bridge definitely allows students to practice independence they’ll have to get used to later in college.”

Senior Keegan Young, however, said that while he feels RBHS prepares a lot of students for college, it fails to help everyone equally. He said he wishes RBHS had made it more clear what opportunities were available during high school to better them for the future. 

“Until last year, I had no idea how to take dual credit classes or what the point of AP classes were, and I was definitely not alone,” Young said. “A lot of the time here at Rock Bridge, if you don’t already know something or are a part of a group, there is a good chance you will never know about it.”

Furthermore, senior Allie Wood said RBHS has done an okay job when it comes to preparing students for college. She said teachers have been very helpful with teaching college skills but that there is not enough time spent teaching life skills. 

“Teachers like Mr. [Jon] Myers give us little life lessons and college tips in my College Composition class, which has helped me a lot because I have learned about things that I definitely wouldn’t have known before I got to college,” Wood said. “I wish [RBHS] had taught more skills like personal finance. I know that personal finance is a class everyone has to take, but even after taking that class, I guarantee that I couldn’t tell you a single thing about what we learned about. If anything, I think that personal finance should be a year-long class so not everything is smashed into one semester.” 

While he believes most students at RBHS are well prepared for education after high school, RBHS language arts teacher Greg Irwin said the school is not able to help as many students as he would like. 

“Through supports like AVID, Dual-Credit Courses, Early College through MACC, Career Center coursework and AP classes, students have many different avenues to develop the skills necessary to be successful in college,” Irwin said. “The reality is that taking these advanced or alternative routes all have their pros and cons, so it’s difficult to communicate all of the diverse opportunities to everyone in a relevant way to each student, especially the students who may fall through the cracks. I wish we had the funding so that virtually every CPS student could take a Career Center class or two. It’s just hard to find the time between extracurriculars and required courses.”

Balboula said teachers at RBHS often have high expectations of students, which she thinks will really help them get ready for college. She said it would have been helpful, however, if more teachers worked on improving students’ public speaking skills. 

“Many people I know of still are afraid to stand in front of the class and give a presentation, me being one of them,” Balboula said. “That’s quite upsetting since communication skills are crucial for the real world. Therefore, it would be helpful if RBHS could strategically incorporate more speaking in the majority of their courses.”

Additionally, Young said RBHS has good teachers that teach necessary skills for college, but he said they sometimes focus too much on college preparation, instead of overall life skills. 

“Education is so important and taking it further into higher education to develop specific skills is imperative to a thriving and developing community. I just don’t think it’s as important as we make it seem,” Young said. “Why aren’t we asking if our time in school has made us better as a person and more prepared for life, because college isn’t just next, the rest of our lives are.”

Do you think your time at RBHS has prepared you for college? Let us know in the comments below.