“Fashion do or fashion don’t” by Kamryn

“Fashion do or fashion don’t” by Kamryn - June 2017 Scholarship Essay

“Bang!” Says the boy, “I want to shoot bad guys.” “Not me.” Says the girl. “I want to help people and be a nurse like my mommy. What do you want to be, Kamryn?” “I want to be a fashion designer!” I could remember the encouragement on their faces. It was sweet, but it did not last very long. Once it hit me that the reality of STEM based learning was a new frontier, that same hopeful kindergartner was broken.
When I went to middle school, my career path changed rapidly. I realized that becoming a designer was too impractical and needed to lower my standards so, I decided that I wanted to be a talk show host. I wanted to be the next Conan or Maury, but once again, my fantasy of being a big super star was not going to come true. Then came along my first year in high school. My bold, creative, and quirky talk show host now wanted to be a clinical pharmacist.
My hopes of being famous were still alive, however when I picked out the classes for my schedule I did not see any classes that pertained to my “dream career”. Of course, there were classes like speech and theater, but nothing that told me about the industry or how could even make my dreams a reality. Despite my unfortunate findings, I did however find many classes for students who were looking forward to becoming engineers, doctors, and ITs.
Although it may be a lot harder to become this huge celebrity than it is to become a nurse or a lawyer, the school system failed at letting me choose who I wanted to be.
In closing, we should allow children to choose their path based on what they want to do and what they believe. We, as a society, tend to try to mold people in who we want them to be and force them into the blue and white-collar world and the secondary school system helps us make it happen.