Graduation Speech : My Educational Experience

II. Main Point (state as a single declarative sentence): The progress that I have made helped me lead up to writing well-developed essays. The main reason I believe my essays are improved because of the time I take on my pre-writing.

Throughout my entire life, I had always been taught to stay quiet and listen to everyone around me. Now, it is my turn to tell everyone what it is that I have learned during that time. Since I grew up with a Mexican family it was hard to attend school and transition from knowing my native Spanish tongue to English. I spent most of my time in an English school environment until I got to high school. In high school, I realized how important it was to embrace my native tongue. Not everyone does that, especially during high school, thus influencing my decision to go to college and major in Spanish. My plan is to graduate college, receive a teaching credential to teach high school students not only how to learn the language or improve on it but

Growing up, all I ever heard was the word college. From the old days of kinder garden and especially up until senior year of high school my entire life revolved around what college I wanted to go to. I believe that most people see a college education as a luxury, a grand accomplishment. There’s many different type of colleges to go to; community college, state universities, and so on. For me, the biggest thing is not where I go to college. For me, the biggest thing is simply to finish my college education and be able to walk across a stage and receive my diploma. A college education is valuable to me because it will help me in life. I will benefit from a college education career-wise, financially, and personally.

College degrees are becoming more common to enter into jobs in the times that we live in now. I know first-hand being a student that a college degree can help me earn more money. I decided to come back to school after graduating high school a little more than 6 years ago. I went out and got a job, more like a few jobs, before I decided that I was better than minimum wage and that the amount of stress I was taking on just was not worth what I was getting paid. I knew I could do better and that I indeed wanted better for myself. Going to college you take classes that teach you skills that you need in the working world, you learn to apply those skills, and after completing a degree you are on you way to high wages. One thing is certain, College provides a better career opportunity for students, regardless of major.

At the very beginning, of when hearing about First Year Experience I was indifferent about going. I knew that if I attended FYE then I would not get my summer after my high school career. Instead, I would graduate high school and then enter school again, but sooner than others. I do wish I had a long summer before entering school again, yet living in the experience now changes my whole outlook of entering college early. There are the good times, bad times, stressful times, and the sad times. One just has to take it all in and try their best to process what happens. I, myself, has done that, and still am doing, since starting the summer program. And with every decision I make, they’re either a benefit or a toll on my body both physically and mentally.

When I was in high school I wanted to be like everybody else. I wanted to fit in and meet some new friends. With meeting new friends I met the good ones and the bad ones. What I didn’t realize at that time was the bad ones were only going to bring me down and make me skip school.

College hasn’t really been much of a choice for me—same way for walking the stage at graduation in high school. Yeah the “option” to opt out has “always” been there, but God forbid I get to make my own choices as an adult by my mother (but that’s something else entirely). My relatives’ continuous badgering, threats, and my patience running out after fifteen years of their actions “convinced” me to start to college anyways. I mustn’t leave out the fact that I also convinced myself that if I started college early, I would potentially graduate around the same time as one of my favorite cousins and one of my friends. I started taking dual credit courses in high school to shut my mother up about advanced schooling, ended up liking the teachers

In 2010, Grant High School, set out to improve (Lambertson 42-43). This school quickly went from being in the worst 5% of schools in Michigan to the superior 92% (Lambertson 43-45). This school poured effort into its programs to try to bring up test grades (Lambertson 42-45). Amazingly, Grant High School brought its average ACT score up 2.4 points in around three years (Lambertson 45). However, in the end, was this school successful? Were its students prepared to succeed?

Having lived, and grown up in a small Oregon town, my educational background was similar to most with a public high school education during the early 1980’s. The school did not offer advanced placement courses, but the experience was positive, and many of my classmates would go on to college, graduate with advanced degrees, and become successful in their chosen fields. There was not one singular event that prevented me from on time graduation at a university, rather, it was a series of decisions that I made overtime that altered my course.

After graduating high school, several students decide to go off to college while many others find want to take a break from school, then continue later on. Sometimes, there are people that have entity approach intelligence where they believe that college is not for them and therefore find something else to do, so they look for jobs and decide to work. They believe that if they try to get into this new environment, they will not even achieve anything; therefore, they do not even want to try. Some of them cannot go because of financial reasons. Once they start going, they drop out because their savings are depleted. Because financial reasons is considered as one of the factors that triggers a lot of people to drop out of school, I believe that there should be a reduction in the cost of college.

High school teachers try to explain what college is like, but it 's hard to imagine until you actually start college classes. I 've learned that college has some similarities to high school but overall, it is a completely different atmosphere. Entering college, you will see a major change in the way that you are treated. Unlike high school, you are treated as an adult. Your professors give you the responsibility that you never had before, such as doing your homework or not, allowing you to leave class without asking, and most importantly, giving you the choice to come to class or not. However, a lot of people take advantage of not having to go to class every time but being in class is very important, especially in EN 101. You don 't miss out on the notes that the professor gives, you get time with your classmates to evaluate each others writing, you have time to talk to your professor and ask questions, you get to see examples of papers which will give you ideas and kick start your drafting process, and most of all you aren 't wasting the hundreds of dollars that you paid for the class. I encourage you to do your very best to make it to each class, because I promise it will ease a lot of stress and you will do better academically.

This class, UWP 104FY, has lead me to realize the areas I struggle in and how I overcame those struggles. When I entered this class, I lacked practice with writing and was unable to adjust my habits to accommodate the flow of this course. I had not written an essay, except for research papers, since my fall quarter of freshman year. It was especially hard for me to adjust my time to account for all the activities in the class. Since the course is a hybrid course, I only had one face-to-face meeting with the class. Half of the class requires self-pace and constant checking of what needed to be accomplished. With my initial abilities, I was unable to excel in the course. However, as the course progressed, I was able to change some of my

It was a beautiful and sunny Sunday morning the day after I graduated from Villanova University. My parents were hosting a graduation brunch for me at the scenic Valley Green Inn in Philadelphia’s historic Fairmount Park. There were over a hundred guests present that day, a mix of family, friends, and others who made an impact on me over the course of my life. It was just a few short months away from the beginning of law school.

In every classroom, there will also be students who come different backgrounds. Students will come from different cultures, various levels of poverty, numerous religions, and assorted family structures. When there are a variety of cultures represented in a classroom, it is the job of the teacher to make every student feel welcome and special. Getting to know students and parents and having a warm, inviting classroom culture are a few ways to help students from different backgrounds have the best experience in school they can.

Five years ago, I graduated from High school in Cartagena, Colombia. I almost did not pass my last year of school because my academic grade was not superior, especially in languages which I had to retake. In addition, I was not clear about my future, and it looked very hard to determine what career would be benefit for me. Moreover, my parents worked hard and in many circumstances they limited the basic need for the home or for themselves in order to pay me a high education level. I was in pressure for my family because they were expecting a great career and job for me, and I was not showing a good academic standard. Even more, I was expecting a important and completely change in my life, I was moving to another country, United State of America. Now, I was more concern about my future education. If I could not demonstrate an excellent or academic performance in Spanish, how it could be better in other language. However, my perspective in education seem more optimistic since I was part of Polk State College through the change of my mind and behavior, the support of the Community College, and the programs which offer many benefits to those students who one to overcome.