B.L.

Blake Lovasz

“Probably a lot of it would have to be the trust. I really feel as though I’m respected by my teachers. I don’t know if it makes me enjoy interactions more but it’s just a bit different. And another big thing would probably be a lot of people here are very respectful, and that’s definitely important. I feel as though it helps me grow a lot more if I do feel as though my ideas are respected. It helps me grow and helps me be more open minded. My outlook on identity and mental health has greatly improved. I used to believe that everything was binary with rigid rules, which is what impacted my mental health severely and it really took having a couple of classes with people who were just more outspoken about different mindsets and thought different things that helped me just shape myself a bit more to something that is more beneficial. I think if I had stayed where I was, prior to moving to Community, I do not know if I would view a difference as positively.”

Zzander Mclane

“My senior year, I’ve had a lot of freedom. I can kind of take whatever classes I want, which is especially great because we have some pretty awesome programming classes that I’m interested in. My dream ever since my childhood, literally as long as I can remember, was to make games. I only got the chance to learn because of Community. It’s definitely the self pace about the programming classes. It lets me take my time with what I need to take my time with and speed through the stuff that I can do easily which is how it’s helpful. I’m in the robotics team, and that’s been pretty awesome. I really liked that we get to do something awesome. We get to build this robot and go to competitions, while still having a lot of fun with it. You know, hanging out, eating snacks while we work on the robot. It’s a lot of fun. Hopefully I’ll go to WCC and do some nice programming stuff in the future. I had a genuinely great time at Community. And I think Community was just the change I needed. It’s such an awesome place that has had so many nice people.”