Back to new Transitions - Re-Engagement Edition

by Sharaya Bond
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When I first started high school it was harder than I expected. The first high school I attended was Salisbury East, which is in Adelaide. The first semester was hard to settle in. The schoolwork was harder than primary and I was ashamed to raise my hand. I thought the other kids would laugh and might think that I'm dumb because the primary school was learning at your own pace. I felt I hadn't learnt enough to be at this new school.

The students at this school were snobby rich kids who thought they were ‘all that'!

My Aboriginal counsellor was good at first and helped me settle in, but then I started slacking off at school and she would hassle me to come to school and would say things like, ‘Your grades are low'. I told her the reason why I was missing school was because my Mum had an accident and had hurt her leg. My counsellor told me that wasn't a good enough reason.

Mum healed up and I started coming back to school, but I was behind in all my schoolwork and I would ask the teacher if I could do extra work at lunchtime, but he rejected the idea and said it was my fault for missing out on school. My home grade teacher was also my SOSE teacher and that was about the only class I passed, which was very good.

Later that year I had trouble with a student who was being very racist towards me. He was calling me racist names, but I wouldn't dob and tell the teachers, so I gave it back to him. It started to get very serious so then I decided to tell the teacher. When I told him he told me not to worry about it and to sit back down. Feeling really angry I reacted and cracked. I started to yell and be very aggressive, I grabbed my stuff so I could go and talk to my Aboriginal counsellor. She was at a meeting so I caught the bus and wagged school for the whole day.

When I first came to Southside I was nervous and thought I would be the only indigenous girl, but when I went to my first class I saw two other girls and I felt comfortable. My big sister came to this school, but has graduated. The youth workers are very helpful and have helped me through my problems at home and at school which has helped a lot to keep my head up at some points. I felt useless because of all the stuff that was happening and didn't want to come to school anymore. I started slacking off class and getting very bad grades, but then, with their support I snapped out of it and started to catch up, which was a relief to all the teachers, and me!

Now that I am at Southside, I feel I can do anything and can be whatever I want if I just put my head down. I'm so glad that I am at this school and I just want Colleen and Lorraine to know that there is no better school and thank you for being there for me and my family.

* The Re-engage This! multimedia competition was open to young Queenslanders aged between 12 and 25 years. This is one of 6 entries (the winners) that were chosen for publication.

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