I thought I had it all figured out. I thought I could just cruise through school and not have to worry about how grades affected my future. I consider myself a smart person, but have to admit I did not perform like one in my early years of high school. I attended a middle school that placed a lot of importance on academic excellence, performance, and discipline (Kipp South Fulton Middle School). As a result, I was the school spelling bee winner three years in a row and won the Math Highest Achievement Award for two years. Excelling became relatively easy for me – but then came high school. I attended a public high school that is quite diverse and had so many students! I felt like a small fish in a big pond. It felt like I went right to college! I experienced freedom like I never experienced before. At the beginning of high school, I started in earnest. I wanted to do well, but as my Freshman year went on, I tended to try harder in my core classes and disregard my elective classes. I didn’t think my elective classes counted (and didn’t think homework counted for much either). I thought I could go to class and just take the test and disregard the rest. I have always been a good test taker and thought I could get by just on that. Throughout my Freshman and Sophomore years, I was competing with my soccer team, winning state and U.S. Soccer regional championships, as well as competing in U.S. Soccer national competitions. So, I was doing well in my athletic life, but academically, I was letting myself down. After switching high schools, I re-focused and improved. I have a wonderful mind and have the potential to do wonderful things with it. I was more invested in “being cool” my first two years in high school and completing my homework assignments and getting good grades seemed to be the opposite of being cool. As a result, I find myself trying to overcome with better testing grades, because I can’t go back and improve my cumulative GPA – which is now holding me back as conduct my scholarship search. I would imagine there are other smart students entering high school feeling the same way and doing the same thing. If I could, I would love to talk to every student entering high school and make them realize why it is important to high the ground running and that every year counts. It’s okay to have fun along the way, but don’t take your eye off the prize and treat every year like you are being scouted for the next one! My educational goal is to major in Finance and ultimately obtain a Master's degree in Finance. In the meantime, I would like to become a certified tutor and tutor disadvantaged students in Math. I have always performed well in Math, and even received the highest Calculus award in my senior year of high school.

I thought I had it all figured out. I thought I could just cruise through school and not have to worry about how grades affected my future. I consider myself a smart person, but have to admit I did not perform like one in my early years of high school. I attended a middle school that placed a lot of importance on academic excellence, performance, and discipline (Kipp South Fulton Middle School). As a result, I was the school spelling bee winner three years in a row and won the Math Highest Achievement Award for two years. Excelling became relatively easy for me – but then came high school. I attended a public high school that is quite diverse and had so many students! I felt like a small fish in a big pond. It felt like I went right to college! I experienced freedom like I never experienced before. At the beginning of high school, I started in earnest. I wanted to do well, but as my Freshman year went on, I tended to try harder in my core classes and disregard my elective classes. I didn’t think my elective classes counted (and didn’t think homework counted for much either). I thought I could go to class and just take the test and disregard the rest. I have always been a good test taker and thought I could get by just on that. Throughout my Freshman and Sophomore years, I was competing with my soccer team, winning state and U.S. Soccer regional championships, as well as competing in U.S. Soccer national competitions. So, I was doing well in my athletic life, but academically, I was letting myself down. After switching schools, I re-focused and improved. I have a wonderful mind and have the potential to do wonderful things with it. I was more invested in “being cool” my first two years in high school and completing my homework assignments and getting good grades seemed to be the opposite of being cool. As a result, I find myself trying to overcome with better testing grades, because I can’t go back and improve my cumulative GPA – which is now holding me back as conduct my college search. I would imagine there are other smart students entering high school feeling the same way and doing the same thing. If I could, I would love to talk to every student entering high school and make them realize why it is important to high the ground running and that every year counts. It’s okay to have fun along the way, but don’t take your eye off the prize and treat every year as if you were being scouted for the next!