Senior goodbye: David Rowland

David Rowland

Dear Archbishop Carroll,

Thank you for teaching me how to be a responsible person. When I arrived here I was a much different person then I am now. Many things have changed, such as my demeanor and the way I look at myself. I got here my sophomore year not knowing anyone and I was thrown under the wing of my basketball team. This was important as it gave me so many new connections — people that I will know for the majority of my future and ones that I will only know for the duration of my stay here. Regardless, I couldn’t have made it through here without them. The shaping this has done to my demeanor was tremendous. Initially, I had a negative, closed-minded attitude towards the people and things around me. I felt like I didn’t want anything to do with anyone around me I didn’t previously know or feel comfortable with. This proved to be trivial as it’s hard to already know people you’ve just met. 

The open-minded attitude I developed whilst at Archbishop John Carroll High School has served me even outside of school. It has helped with creating more concrete, long-term friendships and I would be a completely unrecognizable person without it. I have also developed new hobbies and come out of my shell here at Archbishop John Carroll High School. I stopped playing basketball because I realized I didn’t have as much of a passion for it as I had really hoped. This turned me to skateboarding, which is my favorite pastime. As odd as that may sound, that really is how it went. I turned to skateboarding after realizing how I was channeling all my energy into something that I wasn’t truly passionate for. This pushed me to find what I really was passionate about. 

Finally, I turned my grades and attitude around when I got here. It might have taken me about a semester and a half to do so but I still got there and never looked back since. I’m extremely grateful for finding myself in that way here.

Thank you,

David Rowland