Girl’s Middle School (GMS) graduates Sarah Bordon, Sarah Miller, Alex Stikeleather, Maria Valladores, and Miriam Yelton, never expected their seventh-grade entrepreneurial assignment to get published and sold online and in popular bookstores.

"Middle School: How to Deal" is a book designed to help teen and preteen girls survive middle school years. The girls wrote the book as seventh graders, and after three years the current sophomores have their first book published. Miller, Stikeleather and Yelton go to Paly, Borden goes to Castelleja, and Valladores goes to Menlo Private School.

"Middle School: How to deal" first came out February 10, 2005 on Amazon.com. The 96-page soft cover edition is selling for $10.54. The hard back version will be sold for $15.99 when it comes out in Kepler’s and Border’s bookstores in April.

The book contains a variety of tips for surviving the sometimes socially challenging middle school years. Among its contents, it contains an Instant Messaging (IM) key, with translations of the jargon and common abbreviations used when IM-ing. It also contains a guide to personalizing your room and tips on time management including planning outfits the day before special occasions and addresses other teenage topics from the fears of the first day of school to boys. The book consists of tips on relaxing, and talks about the issues of standing up in class and popularity.

"We were never expecting it to actually get published," Stikeleather said. "It was really exciting."

The GMS entrepreneurial assignment gives seventh graders an opportunity to experience the challenges of making and sustaining a business. Working in groups of 4-5 and coached by volunteer business professionals, students make a sale’s pitch to possible investors for their creative project. Previous products have been jean bags, earrings, cards, and other original creations. Students go through the process of making the product, and selling it.

"We wanted to do something that could outlast the project," Yelton said. "We wanted to do something no one else had done, and reach out to girls nation-wide."

The girls met once a week throughout the four-month process to discuss the production, and meet with the editor and publisher.

"It was hard having to be business partners with my friends," Miller said. "Sometimes it was hard to keep business problems separate from our social relationships."

The final version of the book is almost identical to the original version the girls wrote. The only significant change the editors made was an alteration to the title. Originally the book was called "6th grade happens to the best of us".

"The tone and the writing style was kept the same, It is still our voice," Miller said.

"Middle school; how to deal" appeals to teens especially because it was written by people who recently experienced the dramas of middle school years e. As the authors say in the introduction, "We are not professional writers, but we were professional middle schoolers!!"