Ryan Castle, the new principal at Muscatine High School, has been doing a great job of keeping everything in check and enforcing the rules. However, what would you do if you were the daughter of the principal?
Brynn Castle is the daughter of Ryan Castle and attends Muscatine High School as a Sophomore. She is taking 2 AP classes, AP Biology and AP Psychology, along with 2 Pre-AP classes, Pre-AP English 10 and Pre-AP Algebra 2 (Honors), as well as 3 electives, Agriculture 1, Orchestra, and Spanish 3.
“They’re looking pretty good. I have all A’s except a B+ in AP Biology.” Brynn said.
It’s easy to assume that being the daughter of the principal must have an impact on how her grades are impacted and how hard she has to work, but how does it affect her?
“If my parents know that I tried on a test or something, they generally don’t care. They have faith that I’ll get my grade back up unless I’m failing a class that I shouldn’t be failing, but I’ve never done that so I don’t know how they would react to that,” Brynn explained.
Brynn is an exceptional student, taking mostly upper-classmen classes at this high school. Her parents don’t typically care about her grades as much, but what about the standards that Brynn is being held to?
“I think they have pretty high standards for me but not unachievable standards because they know that I get my work done and I’m generally a good kid so they have high standards for me,” Brynn said.
Brynn is involved in school activities, such as swimming, tennis, and Key Club. But with being so involved how does she maintain the standards she’s asked of?
“It’s been like a little bit of an adjustment this year because I’ve never taken AP classes before but I always make sure to talk to them [her parents] about it in case their standards kinda fluctuate depending on the class,” Brynn states.
It’s important to have a close relationship with your parents, no matter what role they have in the real world. But it’s not always about the standards your parents hold you to, there are the standards that you hold yourself to as well.
“When I have bad grades, it makes me feel stupid. I also like to stay perfect with everything I do, but that could be a me thing,” Brynn said.
Brynn is a very kind-hearted person and positive in negative times. However, even though Brynn is one of the many exemplary students in 10th grade, she still has doubts about herself and how she thinks.
“I try not to let them [grades] impact my self-worth but that doesn’t mean they don’t. They do, like a lot. I check Powerschool, like, all the time. Seeing that I have something bad, like under a B, it eats at me. All I think is ‘I have to get it up’. It’s kinda degrading,” Brynn said.
Others think that being a high schooler is easy as pie, but they don’t see the full picture. They see the grades and the sports. They don’t ever see the struggle of maintaining the life you are living, whether it’s your school life, athletic life, activity life, or home life. Brynn Castle gave us her perspective on balancing her school life with her home life and activity life, as well as balancing her life of being the daughter of our principal, Ryan Castle.