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Silverstein has been working toward her dream of becoming an Olympic-level gymnast since she was a young.
Photo: Contributed PhotoSilverstein has been working toward her dream of becoming an Olympic-level gymnast since she was a young.
Silverstein has been working toward her dream of becoming an Olympic-level gymnast since she was a young.
Silverstein has been working toward her dream of becoming an Olympic-level gymnast since she was a young.
STAMFORD — It is obvious that Stamford High School students don’t typically interact with a large number of home-schoolers - we spend all of our time in public school, after all. However, as little as we hear and know about them, they surely exist. As of 2019, it is estimated that 1.8 million students in the United States are homeschooled.
One of those students, Jada Silverstein, decided to make the big switch to public school for her senior year.
Silverstein is from Long Island, New York. There she attended and finished public elementary school. However, she admitted that she never really liked it. Silverstein found that the social aspect was hard for her and she was never the best at making friends.
“I was begging my mom for years to homeschool me,” Silverstein said.
Silverstein also knew that switching to homeschooling would help her pursue her real dream: to be an Olympic gymnast.
Silverstein had wanted to be in the Olympics for as long as she could remember, and when she was about 9 or 10, that started to become a real possibility. She enrolled in an online homeschooling program, Laurel Springs School, in sixth grade, which allowed her education to be that much more flexible. She was able to begin training for seven to eight hours a day, six days a week - the amount of time a typical adult spends at work.
“It felt like a job,” Silverstein said. The gymnast hadn’t even been on a real vacation since she was 6 years old because of how frowned upon it was to miss valuable training time.
With this switch in intensity, things became more serious and more demanding. On top of that, issues with coaches and teammates led Silverstein to switch gyms numerous times in an attempt to find the right fit.
“It was very confusing and difficult,” Silverstein said.
With this came a roller-coaster of emotions. Silverstein was constantly battling with both mental and physical strain, whether from bad relationships with her trainers or her extremely demanding regime. She explained that oftentimes her love for the sport withered.
“I wanted to quit many times,” she said.
However, this led to even more inner turmoil for Silverstein. She has already put so much time and effort into her sport.
At the same time, Silverstein’s homeschooling situation intensified as she moved on to high-school-level curriculum.
“I was excited at the beginning,” she stated. “But after a while it began to get really hard.”
This newfound stress, on top of her gymnastics career, began to add up.
So, in ninth grade Silverstien made her final decision: she would cut back on gymnastics. Silverstein acknowledged that this meant that she would no longer be training elite, which would have been her next step toward becoming a true Olympian.
“My mind and body have been through a lot,” Silverstein said. She reduced her training to four hours a day.
With this switch, Silverstein found it possible to return to public schooling. However, she faced an issue: the online learning program she was using was California-based, and it did not meet the requirements of the New York public school system. If she were to go to school in New York, she would have to repeat a year. So, Silverstein resorted to the next best option - moving to Stamford, Connecticut.
What made Stamford particularly appealing to Silverstein was the fact that that’s where her current gym, Chelsea Piers, is located.
“My dad was joking at first,” Silverstein said in regards to the idea of moving to Stamford. But with time, as driving an hour and a half to practice every day became more and more of a nuisance, moving to Stamford was a real option. “And now I’m here,” Silverstein said.
Her family bought an apartment in Stamford. Silverstein lives and attends school here on weekdays and travels back to Long Island on weekends.
Now that she is a student at Stamford High, Silverstein is able to experience all that public school has to offer. She recently played the engineer in “Elephant’s Graveyard,” the school’s fall production. She is a member of the drama club and is considering joining the Stamford High gymnastics team.
Silverstein said she mostly likely won’t be continuing her gymnastics career in college. However, she plans on finding other ways to pursue her passion.
“Gymnastics will always be a part of my life and I want to keep it that way,” Silverstein said.
Overall, Silverstein is appreciative of her journey.
“I would not be the person I am today without it,” she said. It has taught her to be “resilient and strong,” she said.
Despite a number of setbacks along the way, Silverstein’s final take on her experience is positive.
“It was a hard and damaging journey,” she said, “but I don’t regret it at all.”
Sofia Sarak is a junior at Stamford High School.
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