The beginning of a new academic year can feel exciting from the outside. There are new classes, new teachers, new schedules, new activities, and the possibility of starting over in places where last year's labels no longer matter quite as much. For many teenagers, however, one of the biggest questions has very little to do with academics: Who am I going to hang out with? Even students returning to the same school can suddenly find themselves looking at a completely different

Over the years, I have had the honor of watching hundreds of students move through high school and graduate. I have been even more fortunate to know many of them personally. We have celebrated acceptances, leadership roles, improved grades, new friendships, and moments of courage, but we have also worked through overloaded schedules, disappointing results, difficult course choices, and the uncomfortable realization that there is not enough time to do everything well. Because

Every semester, our Frolific students take a deep dive into one question: how can we make the middle and high school experience easier for students coming after us? They speak with other students, compare experiences, look for patterns, and try to understand what makes some students settle into school faster while others spend months feeling as though they are still trying to find their place. Every semester, they uncover a few golden nuggets that adults may easily overlook b

Sometime around the middle of July, summer begins to feel a little like Sunday night. The freedom is still there, the days are still long, and no one is setting an alarm for 6:00 a.m. just yet, but the feeling that Monday is coming slowly begins to creep in. As August approaches in Georgia, the back-to-school displays become harder to ignore, school emails begin arriving, and parents start mentally preparing for early mornings, packed lunches, carpool lines, and the return of

We are halfway through summer in Georgia, which means the first burst of “we are going to use this summer well” energy is slowly being replaced by humidity, late mornings, and a very convincing inner voice that says, “Let it slide. It is summer.” No matter how disciplined you are, summer has a way of wrapping you around its finger. It starts innocently enough with one late movie night, then one lazy morning, then one “they worked so hard all year, let them sleep,” and before

When parents come to me and share that their child is sensitive, what they usually mean is that their teen takes things deeply to heart, replays conversations in their mind, and sometimes struggles to separate a passing comment from a statement about who they are as a person, and if you are raising a teen like this, you are not alone because this is one of the most common emotional patterns I see in adolescents today. In most cases, sensitivity is not the problem, because sen

Summer has a way of slowing us down a little. The weather invites us outside, and if we allow ourselves, even for a few minutes, nature has a way of making us think about things we were too busy to think about during the year. One such reflection came to me recently during a morning walk in the woods with my dog. As I walked, I found myself thinking about a question I hear often, sometimes directly and sometimes hidden inside a conversation. What does it really mean to find

Summer always arrives with such good intentions. After weeks of all-nighters, last-minute submissions, performances, recitals, and packed calendars, summer arrives like a warm breeze of relief, at least for the first few days. Then, not too long after, that warm breeze starts to feel hot and unbearable. The house gets messier, the snacks disappear faster, and teens are somehow both bored and unwilling to do anything suggested by a parent, and many of us parents have the same

Why Even High Achieving Teens Need Speaking Tools Every semester at Frolific, I get to work with some of the most high achieving children I have ever seen. They are intrinsically motivated, diligent, thoughtful, and humble. They care about doing well, they take their responsibilities seriously, and they often walk into class with the kind of competence that makes you think, “This child is going to be just fine in life.” And then we begin our communication module. More specifi

Part 2 of our student-created series, How to Nail High School Co-authored by Frolific Innovation for Leadership Students: Allen Peralta, Basheer Qutob, Ishika Sujith, Jessica Kochhar, Nandana Krishnan, Navya Neelam, Pranay Srikantapuram, Priya Mathur, Shree Doshi, Srilasya Sanivarapu, Vihaan Joshi. In our Innovation for Leadership module at Frolific, students solve a real-world problem that is directly applicable to their lives using Stanford’s design thinking approach to pr

Part 1 of our student-created series, How to Nail High School Co-authored by Frolific Innovation for Leadership Students: Allen Peralta, Basheer Qutob, Ishika Sujith, Jessica Kochhar, Nandana Krishnan, Navya Neelam, Pranay Srikantapuram, Priya Mathur, Shree Doshi, Srilasya Sanivarapu, Vihaan Joshi. In our Innovation for Leadership module at Frolific, students solve a real-world problem that is directly applicable to their lives using Stanford’s design thinking approach to p

A few weeks ago, I asked my students a simple anonymous question: If you could tell your parents something that would help you grow, what would it be? As expected, some students talked about grades, pressure, yelling, and wanting more breaks. Those are themes I hear often, and honestly, they are worth listening to every single time because they reveal so much about what our teens are carrying beneath the surface. But one response caught my attention for a different reason. On

We all want our children to be relentless. We want them to keep going when life disappoints them, frustrates them, embarrasses them, or simply refuses to go according to plan. We want them to have grit. We admire perseverance. We read books like Angela Duckworth’s Grit, we nod along to the research, and we tell ourselves that the children who learn to push through hard things are the ones who will thrive. But there is a deeper question hiding underneath all of that. If persev

Lately, I have found myself deeply moved by the interviews that followed the Artemis mission around the moon. There was something about hearing the astronauts speak after seeing Earth from that distance that stayed with me in a way I did not expect. Out of all the reflections I listened to, the one that struck me most was Christina Koch’s description of what it felt like to look back at Earth. She spoke not only about the beauty of the planet itself, but about the vast darkne

In this series, What Teens Wish Their Parents Knew , I share the honest truths teens wish adults understood a little better. Because I work closely with teenagers, I get to ask them questions like these anonymously. That matters, because when teens know they can answer honestly, they usually do. And what is so striking is that one student’s answer so often reflects what many others have been feeling all along. This week, I want to explore something a 15 year old shared in his

From everything I have seen, high school is not just a step up from middle school. It is a completely different world. In middle school, friendships often happen without much effort. Students see the same peers every day, sit next to them in class, and slowly build connection through shared routines. It feels natural. And then high school begins. Suddenly, that rhythm disappears. Their friends are not always in their classes anymore, the hallways feel bigger, the expectations

Mastering time management begins with failing at it. That may sound counterintuitive, especially in a world where we celebrate perfect routines and polished planners, but let me explain what I am seeing every single week. I am currently in the middle of parent conferences, and one theme keeps surfacing in almost every conversation. It is not a lack of intelligence, it is not a lack of opportunity, it is not even a lack of motivation. It is the absence of effective time manage

High school has a funny way of surprising families. Many parents imagine that once their child gets into a good high school, the path forward will somehow become clearer. It feels like things will start to fall into place. Students will take the right classes, join the right activities, and gradually build a strong profile for college and life beyond school. But when I talk to my students, I hear something very different. For many teenagers, high school initially feels less l

“I promise I try, even if you can’t see it.” — Age 14 If you are reading this blog post, it likely means you are already a deeply invested parent. You are trying to support your child in becoming their best self while also being mindful not to become overbearing. You are aware that your own perspective, shaped by your experiences and the era you grew up in, may not fully capture what your child is navigating today. So you are seeking other perspectives, listening, and staying

I recently asked my students a question that many parents had requested I bring to them: “What is it that you wish your parents knew in order for you to be more successful?” I received over a hundred responses. The very first one came from a 17 year old: “When I want to tell you something, I don’t want a lecture. I want comfort.” That response captures something many parents struggle with: how to respond when teens come with problems. If you are a parent, I want you to resist