I know everyone hasn’t heard that much from me second semester, but that’s because all my stories are videos. Videos can’t actually go in newspapers, so they’re online. We all know how many students go to the web online. Anyway, I guess it’s "let’s hear Rory’s high school story" time. I’ll make it short. A bunch of stuff happened, and I ended up transferring to Ames from Ballard, and it was the best decision of my life. I did a bunch of schoolwork sometimes, and sometimes I did other things. Junior year, I took Intro. to Journalism because I felt like it and then I joined the WEB. That’s how I ended up here – that’s about it. I had a good time in high school and everything. Sometimes it was fun, and sometimes it was not. Now I am leaving. Goodbye. Seeing as that was so brief, I guess I also have room for advice for freshmen and the likes. I took a lot of challenging courses in my time here, and I regret it with every fiber of my being. I’ve taken every AP course I could get my hands on and know where I’m going? Some liberal arts school in Massachusetts. Don’t get me wrong, I wouldn’t have it any other way. State schools are too big, and you’d have to be some sort of masochistic workaholic to want to go to an Ivy League, but I could have gotten into any liberal arts school with half the work I did. So that’s my advice to the freshmen. Don’t try too hard, and just play the game by taking courses that look impressive on paper, but in reality are really, really easy *cough* AP Psychology *cough*. Seriously, just play the game because all the kids who took easy classes, and therefore, got great GPAs are going to go to the exact same place you are, and all the kids who took insanely hard courses and did great in them, are still going to Harvard. This doesn’t mean suck at school, but if you’re a B student, it will serve you just as well to get Bs and the occasional A, instead of bothering with the AP courses and getting straight Bs. Because if you do stretch yourself, this is what you get: you get down to the end, with your armful of AP credits and mediocrity, and all you get is a big ol’ middle finger saying "who gives a crap?" Nothing you do in high school matters. Except failing out, getting addicted to drugs, and felonies. Don’t do those things.