When My Weakness Became My Greatest Accomplishment by Jay

When My Weakness Became My Greatest Accomplishment by Jay - March 2014 Scholarship Essay

It really is not that hard to fathom getting an A in one measly class. So how could that possibly be the highlight of my academic career? My initial thoughts on “great academic achievements” were on a larger scale-- things like graduating high school or getting a 4.0 my freshman year of college. However, the more I thought about my own greatest personal academic achievement, I realized it was simply getting an A in a college history class my freshman year. Succeeding in this upper-level history class set the tone for all my future college courses and gave me the confidence I needed to achieve greatness, and I am not even a history major.

In fact all throughout high school history was, hands down, my worst subject. No matter what the course or who my teacher was, I just could not keep up due to my inability to grasp historic events, dates, and other specifics. Even when I took history from everyone’s favorite teacher, famous for passing his students with flying colors and helping them understand history concepts. His lectures just molded together to form a whirlwind of uninteresting, incomprehensible facts in my head. Eli Whitney’s interchangeable parts burned down in the Triangle Shirtwaist Fire in the middle of the Revolutionary War, Thomas Edison and Malcom X were news reporters covering the tragic scene, and I swear it was a dragon that started the fire. Based on my comprehension of early America’s history, it was not surprising when my final grade in history as a senior in high school was not as good as I had hoped. For the next few years I felt like I was permanently labeled as just plain dumb when it came to history classes and there was no cure for my innate historical stupidity. It’s sad how a few bad experiences can drastically affect your self-confidence.

Three years later I found myself at Utah State University as a freshman taking a random American history class to cover one of my general education requirements. As I walked in professor Heath Mitton’s history class the first day, nightmares haunted my thoughts as memories of history classes past filled my head. Those nightmares soon became worse as I found out that this history class I had chosen (because it fit nicely into my schedule) was actually an upper level history class filled with history majors. On top of that, this teacher had a reputation for being a “tough” grader.

After class, I approached my new history professor and expressed to him my concern. “Well you have two weeks to drop this class and find an easier one,” is what I expected him to say… but instead, to my surprise, he said, “It will be hard work for you, but I know you can get an A in this class. I grade students based on their overall progress throughout the course. Even if your base level of history knowledge is at zero right now, if I see you have made great progress by the end of the semester I will give you an appropriate grade. But again, it is not going to be easy for you.”

I was stunned that he did not jump on my self-pity bandwagon and send me home with no hope. Instead he actually believed in me and instilled a new confidence within me. Never have I worked harder to get an A in a class. The faith he had in me drove me to spend what spare minutes I had studying American History and writing more notecards than I had ever written before. Above all, history finally became interesting to me.

When the end of the semester finally came, professor Mitton was proud to give me an A, my greatest academic achievement to date. I was silly to think that I was just naturally ‘dumb’ when it came to history courses and incapable of getting a good grade in them. I gained the foundation I needed to succeed throughout the rest of my college career, and beyond! With hard work, perseverance and confidence, our inabilities can become our greatest accomplishments.