Hi everyone! I currently am in the middle of some petty high school drama - I wanted to ask what to do about it, because it sort of is affecting my high school life; I’ll be as blunt and as quick possible in explaining this.
It happened in my high school’s cafeteria. We - me and three other classmates - are all sitting in our usual spot. The topic of a previous teacher came up. The teacher taught APUSH and three out of the four of us had her last year. Me and another person had her for APUSH, while the other friend had her for US History Honors. The fourth person in our table - let’s call her Elise - did not even have her at all. I commented about how I loved the APUSH teacher SO much as a person - but I had only one issue: I did not like the way she taught. She taught her APUSH through a peer system and her own lectures. The lectures she had were AMAZING, but the peer system was not too good - at least in my opinion. I prefer to learn from the teacher more than my peers, especially in APUSH. However, the peer system is good in certain classes like AP Spanish - learning through other people helped me a lot in the AP Spanish class. For APUSH not so much. Anyway, after I explained the aforementioned information to my cafeteria table, Elise lost it completely! She said that she heard that the APUSH teacher was the best teacher in our school and that the only reason I did not like the peer system in APUSH is because I think I am better than everyone else. Let that sink in: the reason I did not like the peer system in my APUSH class is because I think that I am better than everyone else, according to Elise. Keep in mind that I am a very non-confrontational person who is moderately shy and pretty awkward; however, I responded back by saying that I do not think that at all. Elise continued to say that the peer system is heavily used in college. I commented by saying that my brother, who is currently attending university, told me that his college does not use the peer system to teach. Elise responded by saying that my brother is an exception; however, the person who had the teacher for US History Honors defended me and said the same thing - she has an older brother in university too. Elise got so mad at me and said to me: I could say something so mean to you right now, but I’m going to be nice. I responded quickly and said “Well it’s too late for that. You said that I think I am better than everyone else, when I do not think that all. That was pretty mean.” Elise then looked at me with a look of resigned anger. The rest of lunch was awkward. Elise even got a hold of the friend who defended me and told her to go to the bathroom with her. My friend did, and Elise began to rant about me in the girls’ bathroom. She said sorry about what happened in lunch, but insert my name here is being very difficult and it is causing me anxiety. My friend stood up for me and told Elise not to blame me. She ended up leaving Elise in the bathroom alone.
For some extra background information, Elise is the valedictorian of my grade and she used to drive me to school every morning. Now she doesn’t drive me to school anymore - LOL. She said that we should take a break from one another and that our “conflicting” ways of dealing with stress caused this. Apparently, she likes to internalize stress, while I like to externalize it and put it on other people. Those were her EXACT words LOL! She said that instead of apologizing or anything.
I am wondering where do I go from here? And why would she say such mean things to me? Also, we have several classes with one another - it’s pretty awkward around us still. I would be lying if I said I wasn’t upset about this. I don’t want to be friends with a person who thinks that I think I am better than everyone else and that threatened me by saying “I could say something so mean to you right now, but I’m not.” My take on this situation: I feel like she might feel a bit threatened by me, because we are both high-achieving students. Anyway, I just wanted to let this out to other people, it feels therapeutic getting the opinions of others. Thank you all for your time!
All the best, CelestialAP