Someone asked how Shalhevet has prepared me for the next big stage in my life. Then I realized I have no idea what lessons I will take with me since I haven’t been to college yet. All I can truthfully write about is what I know about Shalhevet’s influences on my growth as a person so far.

I like who I have become, and hopefully my essence and core personality will remain throughout my life. However we as humans are always adapting and developing through the courses of our lives. Our peers and environment greatly affect our way of thinking, our attitude, and even our introspection. So when I graduated from middle school I was at the most awkward stage of my life — not caring about my appearance, addicted to videogames, only two friends in the world and too hyper and silly to be a control freak, which I was regardless.

Now I’m a week away from having graduated from high school. I walked out holding that diploma with more that a handful of my closest friends, more developed political and religious opinions, and a clear style to my appearance — but I still play video games, act silly and when in control can go overboard. Those parts of me are part of my core self.

I may not remember any of the lessons in class I learned or any of the information I crammed into my poor brain; those are not the things we are meant to remember. I absorbed social skills in a kind environment. I learned about hard work and the consequences of procrastination. About prioritizing, rumors, empathy- all through the course of these amazing and sometimes difficult four years.

I don’t know who I would be if I had never come to Shalhevet. Because their caring and loving atmosphere molded me like the waves start to sculpt a rock. It may only get to the outer layer, but the rock is transformed forever.

Assuming I will visit next year, I hope enough people will have read this column (even if they never read a single Shalheaven before) so that I will be analyzed and compared to my senior self by those who remember me fully engulfed in my Shalhevet stage of life. I cannot speculate as to what will be different about me.  I know that my core, what makes me who I am, Rachel Lesel, will never be touched — just newly whittled.