PICKING APART POPULARITY

Most middle- and high-school students would admit that a day doesn't go by without a concern about popularity or fitting in. Why is popularity so important to youths, and how is it attained?

Some say it's based on what you wear or who you hang out with. Others argue that it's all about how you act.

During the summer, a group of youths who had gathered for a teen summit sponsored by Indy Parks at Brookside Family Center took time out to discuss popularity in their lives and at their schools. They are Juniues Chattam, 13; Rodney Nixon, 13; Lutwan Richardson, 16; and Candace Warren, 11.

Popularity is . . . .

LUTWAN: Getting out and having friends and getting to know everybody.

JUNIUES: It means to gather as many friends as you can.

RODNEY: It's not letting anybody do stuff to you.

CANDACE: You may not think you're popular, but another person thinks so.

How to be popular

LUTWAN: It's mostly what you wear. If you go around in jewelry, shirt and everything, everybody's gonna think you're popular.

RODNEY: I think it's personality.

JUNIUES: My big brother Josh, he does make me feel popular because he can play basketball. It's nice to have a big brother that does something with you.

Treatment by others

CANDACE: My teacher treats (popular kids) more highly than the other kids.

JUNIUES: My teacher does punish the popular kids who tease other people. If somebody went up to the board for a question and they couldn't answer it, the kids would laugh at them and my teacher would say it was wrong because everybody in life doesn't have the same brain.

CANDACE: (Kids) want to be popular because then you won't be made fun of.

JUNIUES: I know this one kid who was popular, and then one day he came back to the school and all the friends he used to hang with turned on him because he went out with a girl that somebody else liked.

It changed his whole life. When he was popular, he used to have bad grades and used to always cuss out the teachers, but at the end of the year, he changed his attitude and he got good grades.

LUTWAN: Popularity on TV shows what's happening in the big world.

JUNIUES: Most of them are based on the truth -- that to be popular, girls go out with the biggest and the fastest or someone like that.

How it used to be

LUTWAN: When your parents were in school, didn't nobody dress how you dress. It was mostly black and white colors. Now it's all the name brands and the colors that everybody wants.

CANDACE: I think that when my parents were in school, it was better. Popularity wasn't such a big deal because clothes didn't matter. They went to school to learn, not to look good.

JUNIUES: My daddy told me that back then, it was really on how they acted.

ASSISTANT EDITOR: Carly Decker, 14.

REPORTERS: Evan Daniluck, 13; Olivia Mozzi, 13; and Sarah Wenzel, 11.