Students Take Home Life Lessons

As we men­tioned in a pre­vi­ous blog post, some stu­dents from Ellenville High School in New York were giv­en the assign­ment of read­ing, Into Thin Air by Jon Krakauer. We were thrilled when they reached out to Moun­tain Mad­ness and shared some of the essays that the stu­dents wrote. We were impressed with the life lessons that the stu­dents took away from the book and ulti­mate­ly the tragedy that took so many lives back in 1996. We thought we’d share with you some high­lights from the essays we read.

One of the Ellenville classes

Chris H: ​“Scott Fischer’s life teach­es us to do what inspires us.”

Eliz­a­beth T: ​“A good book can stim­u­late us to have great con­ver­sa­tions and form opin­ions about cer­tain events.”

Jes­si­ca B: ​“It’s impor­tant to not believe every­thing you read because many times it’s only one person’s opinion.”

Mona L: ​“Mir­a­cles do happen!”

Paris R: ​“While an author inter­views many peo­ple in order to write their book, the sto­ries are still told from one person’s point of view.”

Payge Y: ​“So much is involved in a sum­mit attempt of Ever­est: a mon­e­tary cost, a phys­i­cal cost not to men­tion the toll it takes on the moun­tain. Giv­en this, it is true that there are some peo­ple who should nev­er have even been on the moun­tain in the first place.”

And per­haps most poignant was Tes­sa A’s real­iza­tion of how peo­ple react in times of trou­ble and whether they care for oth­ers or only them­selves. Tes­sa believed the best les­son she learned from the book is appre­ci­at­ing life and valu­ing people.

Thank you again to the teacher, Kristy Wil­son and the kids from Ellenville High School for allow­ing us to be a part of this project!