Facing my fears by Dua

Facing my fears by Dua - August 2023 Scholarship Essay

Undoubtedly my biggest achievement throughout my high school career was getting an A in Ap calculus. To some this may not have that much significance, but to me it is a symbol of perseverance. You see, from the minute I received my schedule in the mail the summer before senior year I had immediately emailed my guidance counselor. I wrote, “I would like to switch out of AP calculus, and be put into honors statistics.” This was for a number of reasons. I had a 4.0 GPA, and it was like an urban legend in the school that this class would strip that away from me. Another reason was because of my older sister who had taken the class and described it as ‘torture’. I just felt like with all of my extracurriculars, managing the two clubs I was president of, and my other classes, it just would not have been wise to add the stress of this class onto my schedule.
However, my guidance counselor never got back to me that summer. So I thought, okay, when school starts, the first day of school I would march in her office and demand I get taken out of that class. And that I did. She gave me a form to get signed so that I could get out of the class, but she told me to wait to see what I think of the class, and decide if this is a step I wanted to take. I thought in my head “of course I want to drop this class,” however a part of me also wanted to see if I can face the challenge. So I waited.
Two weeks had gone by of learning limits, and this class felt enjoyable? It felt like I was solving a puzzle, and the satisfaction of figuring out the answers gave me a sense of joy.
No doubt this class was hard. I spent majority of my time studying for this class. Putting in all my effort to make sure I knew how to take the derivatives, or how to take the integrals of equations. But all this work gave me a sense of accomplishment and a sense of passion for something. If I had never challenged myself to take this class I would have never realized how much I really liked math. So getting an A in this class and getting a 5 on the AP test for this class fueled my love for math. Which is why I made the decision to study applied mathematics in college. Using this massive accomplishment that I gained from challenging myself, it directly supports my future goals of being in the mathematics field and working on something that fills me with excitement. Therefore I thank my guidance counselor for pushing me to face AP calculus.