Coming to Secondary Academy for Success, I had no idea that there was stigma. By getting a job and telling more people where I went to school and hearing rude and sarcastic things, I then realized there was so much negativity about it. Drugs and other substances are at all schools, not just at SAS, they are just more known because we are a smaller community of students. We are not bad kids and we are learning in a way that works for us.

Students at SAS are constantly being judged and being put down simply because they needed a different learning environment. One student who I spoke to said one of the reasons they didn’t come here sooner was because of the judgment they’d been hearing from the kids at the bigger high schools.

The reason why this is such a big problem is that students are afraid to come to a school where it’s looked down upon because of the way we learn. We the students of SAS can change the way people view our school. As students who go to SAS, we know what goes on every day and we know how we learn. SAS individualizes learning and tries different things to make school fit for each student.

Being a senior and in my second year here, I feel as if this issue is much larger than just SAS alone. Knowing the amount of people who have gone here or the people who have wanted to come here, but didn’t because of what someone said, is appalling. Personally, deep down I know that we the students alone won’t change the stigma about coming here.

We are a small school of about 100 kids this year, if everyone around you is saying negative things about the school you go to, you’re just going to begin to agree because of that one thing that happened that one time. The things people will say eat you alive and make you believe it’s true. It is crazy how many people stay quiet and are quiet because of what someone else is going to say or think.

SAS is a place where you can feel comfortable and be yourself. We the students of SAS don’t have the power to do it alone, so we as a community of Bothell and surrounding towns can change it.

Theresa Lewchuck

Bothell