Walking into the front doors of FHC, one of the first things you see is the table full of things dropped off for students by their parents. This table is practically the definition of irresponsible. Why do parents have to drop stuff off for students? The answer is simple: high school students these days are incredibly irresponsible, so their parents pick up their slack.

It’s difficult to understand how students could lack such simple responsibilities. Some kids at FHC (probably not all) have sports or extracurricular activities after school. If you think about it, even if you just play a sport after school, all you need is your athletic stuff. It’s not all that hard to remember your extra clothes to change into and your sports bag. Yet, despite the fact that that is such a little thing to remember to bring, so many students appear to forget something that must be dropped off by their parent. Students even seem to forget their lunch, which is then dropped off by their parent. I mean, how do you forget a lunch? You eat it every day, so it should not be that big of a deal to remember to pick your lunch up off of the counter at your house and bring it to school.

One thing that FHC students need to remember is that one day they will be off on their own in the real world. Once you get out into the real world, your parents can’t do everything for you, like pack your lunch, do your laundry, or drop off things you forget. Becoming independent is one of the most important things a teenager can learn. I don’t want to put all of this on the parents of FHC kids, however. Some of the lack of responsibility and independence is because parents do not make their children learn these life lessons. The parents are willing to make kids lunches every day or drop something off that was forgotten by their child. If a parent does not teach responsibility, a person will have a hard time learning on their own.

The biggest piece of advice I can give as an FHC student is to be more responsible. Remember what you need to bring to school. Pack your own lunch. Do your own laundry. Any opportunity that will help you prepare for real life you should take. Because despite how self-sufficient you feel you are, I assure you, you are not. So take responsibility.