The Root of Success by Joseph

The Root of Success by Joseph - February 2023 Scholarship Essay

The objective of K-12 education is to provide a foundation for students to flourish in the real world. However, the root of success can be utilized inside and outside the classroom. The soft skill most vital to a successful education and life is communication. Communication makes it easier to do presentations, convey a point, or even hold a normal conversation. This skill is essential for the real world, as networking and collaborative workspaces require healthy and frequent communication. Within communication lies various subgroups, such as listening, body language, confidence, and conciseness, which are necessary for success.
To make a point, one must also be willing to listen. Keeping an open mind allows new ideas to form while improving previously existing ideas and ideals. Whether on a group project, a class discussion, or advice from a teacher, making sure the person/people around feel heard is essential for creating a thriving environment. With the goal of education to prepare students for the real world, listening is essential when communicating with coworkers and employers to understand the objective and execute it to the best of a student's team's abilities.
Body language is necessary for understanding someone else while also conveying the point. For example, we observed all the speeches when my class was electing a president. One by one, every candidate recited their speech from memory. However, the person who won the election showed passion through hand gestures and eye contact. Communicating a point with passion and emphasis is essential through actions and not only words. It will show the listener that the speaker knows what they are talking about and are passionate about the subject. Reading body language is vital because it can help to understand the audience. Understanding emotions such as anger, sadness, or any other emotion that a subject provokes can help rephrase a point made to increase the chances of receptiveness among the audience. Collecting small clues from body language while exemplifying it is essential to developing communication skills.
Furthermore, confidence is necessary for making any point. When taking a stance on any situation, students must have confidence in their opinion and support it. Although their opinion may need altering because nothing is perfect, being confident allows students to convey their perspectives to other students and peers. However, confidence is far different from arrogance, and learning to differentiate between the two is vital for a collaborative environment that is necessary for a successful education. Confidence allows for clarity in one's voice. Ideas are portrayed much more eloquently and convincingly when speaking confidently than a hesitant speaker. Confidence improves conciseness by clearly conveying a point. When speaking, conciseness is necessary to convey a point. Classmates and the teacher want to avoid hearing presenters do circles around their point. Instead, they want to hear the speaker get straight to the point and provide a compelling and convincing argument of why it is correct. Through confidence and clarity, one's voice can be heard and understood.
Through the multitude of subgroups under the soft skill of communication, it is evident that communication is the most vital soft skill. Through communication, points can be both made and received. Factors such as confidence and body language are consistently used in the curriculum when presenting to a class, peers, or even in class elections. When mastering communication, education will come with ease, and students will be guaranteed more success outside school. The school's goal is to explore possible options for a career later on, and by harnessing communication skills, students will be equipt for the obstacles they encounter beyond the classroom.