Over the years at Parker, I’ve found different pieces of myself in different corners of the school. Student Government helped me find my voice, tennis taught me how to stay calm when everything around me felt tense, and “The Weekly” gave me the space to say things I didn’t know how to say out loud.
But the one place where I’ve always felt like my whole self, the unfiltered, sometimes awkward, sometimes too-loud version of me, is the stage.
There’s something about stepping into the lights that feels like exhaling after holding your breath all day. On stage, I don’t have to overthink how I come across or whether I’m saying the “right” thing. I can just exist. The irony, of course, is that it’s the one place where I’m literally performing, yet it’s the only place where I don’t feel like I am.
Theatre lets me be honest. It gives me permission to feel everything, excitement, fear, heartbreak, joy, without having to apologize for it. And in a high school world that often rewards composure over vulnerability, that kind of honesty feels like a gift.
It’s easy to think of high school as a time to “figure out who you are,” but I’ve realized it’s just as much about finding where you’re allowed to be who you are. That part takes people. You can’t do it alone.
I’ve been lucky to find people, friends, teachers, classmates, who make space for that. The kind of people who notice when you’re quiet, who don’t laugh at the easy joke that puts someone else down, who actually listen when you talk. Those people make the difference between just getting through high school and actually feeling like you belong there. Because the truth is, being yourself isn’t just about confidence. It’s about safety. You can only be real in spaces that feel safe enough for you to show up fully, where nobody expects you to shrink or pretend.
I’ve seen what happens when that kind of space exists. It changes everything. A classroom becomes more curious. A team becomes more trusting. A community becomes more kind. But it doesn’t happen automatically. It takes effort, from everyone. It takes teachers who notice the quietest student in the back of the room. Friends who choose not to pile on when a joke goes too far. Students who check in on someone sitting alone. Every one of those little choices either makes Parker a place where people feel seen, or a place where they hide a little more.
When I think about what I’ll take with me after high school, it’s not grades or titles. It’s the moments when someone made space for me to be real, the teacher who asked how I was really doing after rehearsal, the castmate who told me that nerves just meant I cared, the friend who sat next to me on a day when I didn’t have much to say.
Those moments made high school feel less like a performance and more like a community.
If I’ve learned anything, it’s that belonging isn’t something you stumble upon: it’s something you help build. I found mine in theatre, but it could’ve just as easily been in the art studio, or on the soccer field, or in a club meeting. What matters isn’t where you find it, it’s that you do.
Because once you’ve felt what it’s like to be in a space where you don’t have to edit yourself, you start wanting to create that for other people, too. You start listening more carefully, laughing more kindly, showing up more fully.
And that, to me, is what high school should really be about. Not just preparing for college or careers, but learning how to build spaces where people can breathe, speak, and exist as themselves.
If I could give one piece of advice to anyone still searching for that space, it would be this: keep being brave enough to show up as you. Because the greatest gift high school can give isn’t recognition or achievement, it’s belonging.
And once you find that, the rest tends to fall into place.