Journal # 17 Big issues.

As a high school students, it is difficult to care about something else other than yourself. My busy schedule of homework and entertainment don't allow me to keep up with the news of the world, so my world is center around me and the things I interact with directly and in a constant way. My biggest issue right now is over thinking, and not only academically, but every single aspect of my life. If anything unusual happens, I star thinking about it obsessively to the point where I'm thinking about it even when I'm doing stuff I really enjoy. For example, if somebody talks to me in an unusual way, right away I start thinking about the reason why they're doing it, even when some people wouldn't even notice a thing. This doesn't only applies to my social life, but also to my academical and economic life too. Before making any purchase, I obsessively search the best way of spending my money, even if its just a minor investment, and this year when I bought my laptop, it took me two months to find a laptop I felt comfortably with, and this affected my academical and social life. This problem has led me to over-react and to day dream, thinking about stuff that are meaningless and that will probably never affect me. I believe this issue has to do with insecurities and being afraid of taking risks, it is something I have to work on, and learn to make my life more simple.

Journal # 16 Big risks, big rewards.

When I think about big changes in my life, one clearly stands out from the rest. My decision to study in the US changed my life completely, my academical, social, economic and private life changed in ways I didn't spec, or didn't wanted to spec. My decision to move to the US was not taken lightly, my parents tried to convince me that I should stay there, but I told them that I had the opportunity and that other people would sacrifice a lot more than I would, and that the rewards for struggling a few years would be exponentially greater than the things I lost. When I moved to the US, I abandoned my parents, my friends, my brothers, the city I have lived my whole life in, my comfortable life and my private life, only going back to it on some weekends and on some vacations. A lot of the students that come to the US do it because their parents force them to, but this was my own decision, as I knew that a better educations and a better future awaited a few miles but in a different world away from where I lived. I had to get used to a new city, to a new language, to a new school, and to new people, the change was not easy, it took me a few weeks to realize the situation I had putted myself in and at first I thought it was a big mistake and that I had messed my life up, but my parents were there to back me up, and after a couple months, I knew I made the right decision

Journal # 18 Fixing our campus.

Our campus as an education facility is in great shape, we have labs, plenty of rooms, a well equipped library and computer room. What our school needs is to be more strict with students and to have a tighter grasp on teachers and the way the teach students. As an accelerated student I get the beast teacher in the whole district, but students in regular classes get some teachers that simply don't care about their job or just don't have what is needed to be a good teacher. Even tough most students don't care/realize the situation, it is very important and should be taken care of ASAP. The administration should start by testing teacher on a regular basis, and if the teacher fails to proves he is good at his job, he should be reinstated in a different line of work. Another problem in our campus is the way personel allow the use of illegal substances on campus. It is that every single lunch our bathroom smells unnaturally, and when personnel go in, they either ignore the smell or mention it but don't try to solve the problem or found out who or what caused the smell. It is inexcusable to allow students to do activities like this on campus. Personnel should be assigned to guard places where the use of substances is common. Simple things like this help our campus in immense ways.

Journal # 19 Mandatory school?

In modern times, nothing is more valuable than a good education. We can no longer count on have and comfortable without knowledge. In order to allow every person to have a comfortable life, school should be mandatory, as it allows the nation to form productive individuals that are more than just dead weight in the shoulders of educated people. If school wasn't mandatory, most parents wouldn't sent their kids to school, and since most children are not self-motivated, the wouldn't go to school because they decide it themselves, making a continuous cycle that would stall the nation. If school wasn't mandatory, we would live in a world similar to the one that existed in the XVIII century, with technology that is bad for the planet and for the people. I believe we'd be in that kind of state because newer technology requires more careful research, which wouldn't be possible without an education system. Up to the XVIII century, technology was found with experiments, and up to the XIX century we slowly gained more knowledge thanks to individuals that educated themselves and didn't need someone to teach them. If education wasn't mandatory, we'd still live in a world where we'd believe the cause of diseases are demons, and that any disease can be cured by purging and bleeding.

Journal #20 Talking with animals

Animals tend to live monotonous lives, living without a goal, simply living to eat and perhaps leave descendants. If I could speak with an animal I'd like our conversations to be entertaining and not just about about what we had for breakfast, how funny the sky looks nor the best ways of rolling in the dirt, therefore if I could speak with an animal I'd talk to a cachalot. Their life is in continuous change, moving around the sea and at different profundity, and going to places humans have never go to before. The first thing I'd ask him is what the bottom of the sea looks like, what creature live down there and how it feels to have so  much water on top of you. I'd ask him to bring me animals that are usually not seen on the surface, and also to bring me the corpse of a giant octopus. Being able to bring me the body of a giant octopus easily beats being able to catch a flying disc.