\u201cI hate the nonchalant thing,\u201d Manon Turpin, a junior at Berkeley High School said, when commenting on increasing nonchalant attitudes at BHS. Nonchalant, as defined by the Oxford Dictionary, is an adjective used to describe a person or mannerism \u201cfeeling or appearing casually calm and relaxed; not displaying anxiety, interest, or enthusiasm.\u201d Being \u201cnonchalant\u201d has risen to popularity in BHS and in teen slang all over social media. Searches for \u201chow to be nonchalant\u201d spiked 241 percent in March 2025 on Google, according to the Movchan Agency. Is nonchalance prevalent in BHS? How do students observe its effects in real time? And how does it affect the classroom and social structures of the student body?<\/p>\n
In a Jacket survey, some BHS students described being nonchalant as being reserved and unaffected. Other students wrote in things like, \u201cnot sharing opinions,\u201d \u201cacting indifferent,\u201d \u201cfarming aura,\u201d and \u201cletting the critics talk while I stay in motion.\u201d Whether or not being nonchalant is authentic, or a persona, seemed up for debate.\u00a0 \u201c(Nonchalance) just feels really stupid \u2026 the most nonchalant thing you can do is be yourself,\u201d Turpin said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Students also commented on how nonchalant behaviors can affect a classroom environment, in group tasks and individual work. \u201cI think (it) kind of makes the school environment a bit less welcoming and open, because people don\u2019t share their true reactions or emotions about certain topics,\u201d Corinna Leaf, a junior at BHS, said.<\/p>\n
Some BHS students worried that the culture of nonchalance affects the way they interact with each other outside of academic settings too. \u201cI think that it\u2019s harder to make friends when you\u2019re trying to pretend to be someone you\u2019re not, and trying to act like you don\u2019t care about anything,\u201d Turpin said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Leaf, similarly, is concerned about the depth a relationship can have if someone is acting nonchalant. \u201cI don\u2019t think people know how to interact with each other on a deeper level. I think people just have a basic level of interactions \u2026 and don\u2019t learn to build deeper connections,\u201d Leaf said.<\/p>\n
Students also considered that these consistent behaviors of being \u201ctoo cool for school\u201d could potentially have effects on other students who weren\u2019t originally participating in the fad. \u201cPeople don\u2019t share out or engage in meaningful conversations because they are too afraid of what others think and how they will react, leading to silent classrooms with students pretending to not have opinions or care about school,\u201d Turpin said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s made stuff boring and like, makes you feel like you need to be like that too,\u201d Teiji Moss, a freshman at BHS, said.<\/p>\n
However, some BHS students commented that a students\u2019 nonchalant attitude doesn\u2019t have to be a negative attribute, and may not even be a subject of concern. \u201cI don\u2019t think people care about acting nonchalant, really. I think most people just care about (their) grade in class,\u201d Marc Pons Whitelam, a BHS junior, said.<\/p>\n
Additionally, Moss noticed a difference in nonchalance depending on grade level. \u201cUpperclassmen are probably more nonchalant \u2026 I mean, especially juniors or seniors, because they\u2019re probably ready to leave high school,\u201d Moss said.<\/p>\n
Overall, the effect of nonchalantness is up for debate, as some students feel it is a contributing factor to quiet classrooms, while others don\u2019t think it plays a big role. As BHS rolls into 2026, and trends continue to cycle through, will the nonchalance pandemic continue to prevail at BHS?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cI hate the nonchalant thing,\u201d Manon Turpin, a junior at Berkeley High School said, when commenting on increasing…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":197420,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[143,145,144],"class_list":["post-197419","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-oakland","tag-oakland","tag-oakland-headlines","tag-oakland-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/197419","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=197419"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/197419\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/197420"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=197419"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=197419"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=197419"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}