The Lost Time Capsules

For many seniors, flipping through their Got to Be Me book is a rite of passage, intended to be a time capsule packed with reflections, doodles, dreams, and the kind of questions only a middle schooler could answer, for better or for worse. As the Class of 2025 prepares to toss their caps and turn their tassels, the boxes of Got to Be Me books have been handed out, with seniors paging through and giggling and cringing in the hallways– but for multiple groups of current seniors, that moment is missing. Quest students, STFX students, and the students of Mrs. Pruzinske.

The Got to Be Me books weren’t always a tradition. Originally, Got to Be Me books were purchased products, and the company had stopped making updated versions. Ironically, the current Got to Be Me books were designed by a group of Quest students as a way to update and modernize the old books. The Quest class got together with representatives to make it on InDesign, and then as the project continued forward, it was suggested that the 7th grade Quest students complete the book, rather than completing it in 8th grade when the general education students did, simply chalked up to a discrepancy of maturity.

But in the shuffle of switching the targeted grade level, one year slipped through the cracks, leaving today’s seniors without their middle school time capsules.

“I feel left out of the senior tradition,” Ella Kragerud ‘25, a senior who was part of the Quest program, said. “I wish I had that time capsule to my 8th-grade self like my peers do.”

The trail also leads back to Mrs. Pruzinske, a former 8th-grade English teacher who coordinated the books during that transitional time. She left the district after two years, and while the books were reportedly stored and eventually sent via intra-school mail, their current whereabouts remain uncertain, leaving a third of seniors out of the tradition. 

“It’s a sweet concept and all,” Basil Lefebvre, another senior, said. “But I’m okay leaving whatever my 8th-grade self had to say in the past…so I’m not that beat up about it.”

Still, for some, the missing books represent more than just lost paper. They were intended to be a time capsule– a window to the past and something to look forward to– middle schoolers penciling in a Got to Be Me book daydreaming about who the person to open it again may be. The missing books have sparked conversation. More than just a silly keepsake, they represent a pause; a moment of reflection on how far we’ve come and how far there still is to go, and maybe, for some, that’s what makes this seemingly small loss feel so big.