I know that Wethersfield High School has a diverse community and I am a proud part of it. Here is why.

by: Fatma Bark

I was so nervous and unhappy, but excited on my first day in WHS. I was feeling so alone as everyone seemed to know each other. This feeling stuck to me until the start of the first period.

Even though I joined the school a couple of days later, I felt like everyone was ready to welcome a new student. Feeling of being welcomed is one of the most outstanding feelings that a new student is likely to experience on their first day.

I met maybe more than twenty people on my first day. All of them were smiling, asking questions and ready to offer their help to me. That feeling was like finding a new place to belong. 

My thoughts about being an outsider were able to stay with me until my first ELL class. This class proved to me that WHS was full of students from all around the world and from many different backgrounds. I just met a couple of them, yet there were many others to discover.

I believe I have enough experience to make a statement about a school’s society as I have seen four high schools in total. This is what makes me different from many other students probably,  but it is the same thing that makes WHS a society full of unique people.

I want to include a glimpse of my story to this article. I was a freshman at my dream high school in Turkey in 2016 until the day came and my dad told us he was fired unjustly from the bank that he worked for 16 years.

He wasn’t as sorry as we all were. He always wanted to work abroad and this gave him a space to find what he was hoping. He found a job in an international company and moved to a country that I would never imagine: India. 

There was an education difference between Turkey and India. This led me to stay in Turkey one more year. Away from my parents.

To complete my sophomore year, I moved to my grandparent’s house. The time I spent in Turkey was challenging but I was able to leave Turkey, but there was something bigger needed to worry about. My life in India.

This journey was relatively harder. The need of learning a new language while taking classes in that language was very stressful. In addition to the language barrier, there was a cultural, climate and society change. 

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When I was about to graduate from high school, our visa was ending. The Indian government was going to deport us back to Turkey. Neither staying in India nor moving back to Turkey was a safe option for us.

After an unimaginable yet unique three weeks, we were able to get a ticket to America. The land of hope, success and dream was going to become our new home. 

I really wish to say everything went perfectly once we landed in America but life makes surprises all the time. 

I couldn’t graduate and get my certificate from India and there was an educational difference that needed to be considered. It turned out that I had to repeat the last 2 years of my high school. 

These were the thoughts behind my mind when I started as a junior in WHS, but now I am in the second semester of my senior year. 

This is a little representation of how diverse and colorful each student's lives are. Everyone here came from different backgrounds and yet found a way to fit in the community. 

Actually, people fit in easier than you would think and this is what makes WHS a beautiful high school to be a part of. 

We are a one big family here at WHS. So let us and our school community know: Who are you?
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