All Nonfiction
- Bullying
- Books
- Academic
- Author Interviews
- Celebrity interviews
- College Articles
- College Essays
- Educator of the Year
- Heroes
- Interviews
- Memoir
- Personal Experience
- Sports
- Travel & Culture
All Opinions
- Bullying
- Current Events / Politics
- Discrimination
- Drugs / Alcohol / Smoking
- Entertainment / Celebrities
- Environment
- Love / Relationships
- Movies / Music / TV
- Pop Culture / Trends
- School / College
- Social Issues / Civics
- Spirituality / Religion
- Sports / Hobbies
All Hot Topics
- Bullying
- Community Service
- Environment
- Health
- Letters to the Editor
- Pride & Prejudice
- What Matters
- Back
Summer Guide
- Program Links
- Program Reviews
- Back
College Guide
- College Links
- College Reviews
- College Essays
- College Articles
- Back
Those Who are New (A Play on a chapter from A House on Mango Street)
People who are oblivious walk into our school timidly trying to stay unnoticed. They have heard we are cruel and stuck-up like some of the modern day movie stars. They think we’ll make fun of them and talk behind their backs just because they are new. For that, they won’t even consider letting their guard down. They are the new kid who has only heard about us through false rumors.
But we don’t let our guards down either. We know they’re just another transfer student who speaks with a neat French accent, or the shy kid who is now living with his mom instead of his dad who lives in Utah. We’ve already heard of the kid that went to our rival school, but had to move here because their family wanted a bigger house, from their best friend that goes here.
As school starts, and the kid begins to learn more about how it runs, makes friends and begins to blend in with the rest of the students, we will stop acting like detectives trying to solve a mystery that has no thug. But watch one of us feel the devastation when we find out we have to leave our friends that we’ve been through everything with since second grade and move to one of their schools. The atmosphere will become cloudy and raindrops will fall from our eyes. When we enter the new school, we’ll feel like the last puzzle piece that just won’t fit into the rest of the jigsaw . The story’s the same always and always.