The Next Generation

My friend is a teacher in the local rural high school. This year she has initiated a class on Current Affairs and has 5 students attending. She invited me into the classroom to meet the students and to document their thoughts and opinions on what is happening in the world around them. Our first meeting was strictly discussion and learning. In the next few days they met as a class and determined what subjects were important to them and how they wanted to represent them. Every scene was both planned and haphazard. All students were super aware and, well, teenagers silly and full of life with changing moods and ideas. The most important lesson I learned was that despite coming from varying backgrounds these young adults could talk and express opposing opinions without arguing. They respect each other as individuals. These images are from different visits as we only had 40 minutes each time and way too many ideas for such a short time frame. I do hope to continue the series. It puzzles me that teenagers are often thought of as mindless, opinion less and not capable of having their own ideas. I am even more puzzled after spending time in the classroom with these young adults.