You would never know he’s not from Chicago, or anywhere in the United States, until you talk to him and realize he has an accent. A British accent. Yes, sophomore Shane Faulkner is that new kid  everyone wants to hear speak. Students in every grade have spread the news, and if Shane is spotted, he is immediately asked to speak, to which his common response is: “Well, what would you like me to say?” Usually, this simple response is enough for whomever asked.

“At first I really liked all of the attention,” Faulkner said. “Now it’s almost three weeks into school and I thought people would stop asking, but every once and a while, I am asked to say something.”

At the end of July, Faulkner, his “mum,” dad, and younger brother, moved  from a small village in England named Quendon to Lincolnwood. He has been here before because his family used to come in August to their cabin in Wisconsin.

Although not difficult to adjust to, a huge difference at Niles West as opposed to his old school is dress code and a typical school day.

“People nearly come to school dressed in their pajamas!” Faulkner said, laughing. “I want to look at them and ask if they have just rolled out of bed. Back home, we had uniforms, and teachers were very very strict about uniforms.”

Just take a second to imagine if Niles West had uniforms and how hard it would be for us to adjust to them, and how many people would get “signatures” for not being properly dressed.

“Every student at me old school had a uniform card that had four spaces for four signatures. To get a signature you would have to have committed a dress code violation,” Faulkner said.

Possible violations are:  top button is not done up on your shirt, shirt is not tucked in, you have chewing gum, boys’ ties are not long enough, wearing earrings, girls who wear too much makeup, you aren’t wearing the proper school footwear (black formal shoes), you aren’t wearing a blazer (jacket), girls’ skirts aren’t long enough, boys’ trousers (pants) are not the proper color and type (had to be black or charcoal and formal), girls aren’t wearing black tights, and finally, if you were eating where it is not designated.

Unlike Faulkner’s old school, we are allowed to eat in most classes, we can chew gum, and we can wear almost anything we want, as long as it follows our own dress code rules.

“If you fill up your uniform card with four signatures, you get and automatic after school detention,” Faulkner said. “If you go through three cards, twelve signatures, you get an internal detention. An internal detentions is where you sit in a room by yourself for the day, and then immediately after the school day is over, you have an after school detention.”

The typical school day in England is completely different than Niles Wests’. Instead of nine periods, classes were broken up into hours. Students would wake up and arrive to school at 8:40, where they would go to their first one hour class. After this class they would go to another one hour class. After two classes, there is a fifteen minute break. Then there are two more two hour classes, a one hour lunch, and then another one hour class. Everybody had the same break and lunch time, and classes everyday weren’t the same throughout the week.

“My favorite class is probably autos,” Faulkner said. “Back home, I worked at a car dealership basically doing everything but repairing the cars. I also did some work at a motorcycle restoration company. So this class just helps me learn some more about an interest of mine — cars.”

Leaving an entire life behind to move to a new country is not easy. Friends, family, hobbies, jobs, everything is left behind. Moving gives Shane a blank slate to start filling up again.

“I miss Sunday mornings with my mates, driving our motorcycles around,” Shane said. “I also really miss knowing my way around. I’m totally lost here because I haven’t got a clue how to get around. I had to walk home from school one day and got lost. But I did get home!”

Obviously Shane has an accent, and it’s not always easy to understand what he’s saying because it’s either some British slang or he’s talking too fast.

We don’t realize it, but we have an accent to him too. We use words that he doesn’t normally hear, just like how he uses words we don’t normally hear

“I was in gym class one day and we I had to get a locker. So my teacher, Nicole Reynolds, told me to go past the bleachers and into the door immediately after,” Shane said. “This totally freaked me out. I had no idea what bleachers were. I was looking for some big tub you put your clothes into to bleach. I went back in the classroom and asked what Mrs. Reynolds was talking about. What even is the word bleacher? Those are stairs.”

For the year, Shane wants to make sure he does well in his classes and start selling t-shirts that he designed himself.

“I already have two companies that are willing to help me out in putting my designs on t-shirts,” Faulkner said. “I really want to sell at least a thousand of them, so anyone who is interested let me know!”

Video by Michelle Sproat