They say high school is supposed to be some of the best years of your life. It’s the time for taking on new challenges, exploring different things, and making new friends. During the five years, students go through a rollar coaster of emotions from crazy to stressful to fantastic. Through these challenges, they make many mistakes which leads them to regretting many of their choices. From academics to friendships, this three part podcast will feature different grade 12 students talking about their regrets and how they learned from it.

Episode 1 – A Five Year Journey of Failures

High school is a time to try new things, however, with new challenges comes failures. Farbod Nematifar, grade 12 student from Sir Winston Churchill, is no stranger when it comes to challenging himself no matter the outcomes. This ambitious student shares his failures and regrets during his five years of high school. Along with that, Farbod also shares his next big project and how his past regrets shaped the way he is now.

Episode 4 – Teenagers Talk

As our podcast draws to a close, we reevaluate what regret means to us and what we learned from this experience.

CREDIT:

freesound.org

Episode 3 – Street Performers and Broken Necks

Bita, Arjun and Brendon take a trip to the Downtown East Side, where they meet a couple of colorful fellows and learn something new about regret.

CREDIT:

Running Waters by Audionautix

Secret Conversations by The 126ers

Terminal D by Silent Partner

Episode 2 – Amber’s Grandpa

Gaining an insight into a pensioner’s life, and picking up some wisdom along the way.

CREDIT:

In Albany New York by The 126ers Creative Commons — Attribution 3.0 Unported— CC BY 3.0 In Alb https://creativecommons.org/licenses/…; Music provided by FreeMusic109 https://youtube.com/FreeMusic109

Acoustic Meditation 2 by Audionautix Creative Commons — Attribution 3.0 Unported— CC BY 3.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/…; Music provided by FreeMusic109 https://youtube.com/FreeMusic109

Episode 1 – Initial Thoughts

Before we get into interviewing people out in the world, listen to our concerns and feelings going into the project.

CREDIT:

Open Sea Morning by Puddle of Infinity

“Orange Rose”

In everyday life, we always see a lot of people. However, we only see them as a person just walking by, without really knowing who they are and how they are doing. In this episode, we are interviewing Jeanie, a music teacher who is teaching students music. An ‘ordinary’  person who we might see during a day, just walking by. However, she is indeed a successful person who achieved her goal, and a person who is always on her path to her dream. Through this interview, we can take an insight of her energetic, positive life and her regrets, which allowed her to be the better version of herself.

Sources:

https://www.theflowerexpert.com/content/aboutflowers/flowermeanings/rose-flower-meanings

“Red Dahlia Flower”

In this episode, we went to downtown Vancouver and found Dave, our interviewee, on Seymour St. near Vancouver City Centre Station. He shared his life stories with us, regarding his regrets, earlier lives, family, friends, and how he ended up on the streets. Most importantly, he shared his views on what success means to him. The interview raises our awareness of homeless people in Metro Vancouver and allows us to think deeply about the reason behind regrets. It was a very meaningful interview and it was definitely a new challenge for us to go out there and talk to strangers. We hope you enjoy this episode! 

In this episode of Paper People, Aamir interviews Mr. Nathan Moes, who used to be the substitute teacher for Ms. Rosengren and is now the substitute for Ms. Moore. In place of Ms. Moore, he currently teaches Social Studies and Social Justice, and is known among students who have been in his classes as one of the coolest and nicest teachers in the school. Aamir aims to show that he’s not just a “teacher”, but a person like all of us. He goes through struggles like everyone does, and has regrets like everyone does. Additionally, he touches upon the idea that we all have a similar way of dealing with those regrets .

In this episode of Paper People, Jennifer interviews Mr. Mark Johnston, Churchill’s current Grade 12 counselor. He’s the man that we all go to in order to plan classes or talk about academics, or sometimes as the man that listens and understands when we have a problem we need to work through. It’s easy to forget that Mr. Johnston is his own person with his own feelings, and it’s easy to take advantage of his kindness – especially when it comes to borrowing his stuff, or asking for favours. Jennifer speaks to Mr. Johnston in the hopes of learning more about him, and to get to know a side of him that she’s only heard of from other people.

Racism can affect mental health by leading to drops in self-esteem and depression. This podcast titled, “Let Me Speak”, is not solely for entertainment but to educate people who are not directly affected by racism. Through telling our story and the stories of others, we aim to expose the truth that so many people live. From the interviews of those who have encountered racial discrimination or abuse, we can better understand how to prevent similar actions from occurring in our local community. One will discover ways with which we can assist those who have gone through traumatic experiences with racism.

Podcast created by: Megan Syho, Debbie Chong, Tara Sidhu and Simone Joiner

Thank you to CBC, iMovie and Reaper for making this podcast possible.

Music: Caleb O’brien