High school experience by Maria

High school experience by Maria - November 2020 Scholarship Essay

High school is always filled with cheerful moments and even obstacles that change you as a person and sometimes we don’t even notice them. But every year I have learned something new that has shaped me into the person I am today. The most significant opportunity for me was taking a class called AVID every year this class has taught me everything I will use for college and through life. Before AVID I was a reserved person who didn’t process many things and hadn’t developed many skills. Now I am a whole different person thanks to the opportunity of taking this class.

Since middle school, I have been taking AVID, which stands for Advancement Via Individual Determination, a program to prepare you for college. I decided to keep taking it throughout high school because it would help me prepare for college. Based on middle school, I already knew what to expect from this class; it was going to be tough and would challenge me in several ways. For instance, speaking to an audience because this class had several projects where I had to speak to a large number of people. A similar situation was when I had to get out of my comfort zone to help other people I developed two different skills. In my junior year, we did a community service project, and then we had to present it to the whole class. At first, when I heard about this project, to be honest, I wasn’t that excited about helping. But after experiencing it, my whole perspective changed. For the project, I decided to volunteer at Operation Blue Santa. When I first arrived the supervisor’s attitude affected me because he was so happy making everyone laugh and I got even more thrilled to serve my community. While wrapping gifts I kept imagining how excited these kids were going to be receiving Christmas presents. Also, I can’t lie that when I heard the Christmas music playing it got me into the Christmas spirit. Indeed, after I reflected on the whole project, I realized how important it is to help out my community and socialize with different people. So I decided to volunteer a lot more and I have done more community service outside of school. It has impacted me in a personal way to not only think about myself but to think about how many people out there need help. It comes as no surprise that when you help someone it makes you a better person. I never would have had this experience if it wasn’t part of my AVID class.

Without a doubt, this isn’t the only thing I have learned from this class. In addition to the community service project, I gained presentation skills and organizational skills. After the whole experience came the day I had to present my google slides to the class. Nervously shaking I was standing in front of the class while reading my slides I wasn’t making much eye contact and my voice was shaking. When I finished presenting my teacher came over and gave me some feedback; she told me next time I should make more eye contact with my audience and my voice should be loud and confident. I processed the information my teacher gave me thinking if I want to be an accountant in the future I will probably be giving presentations and having this skill will be useful. I have also obtained more skills over the years for example my organizational skills. I found it important to have a binder to keep all my assignments and keep a planner to write when my homework is due. This helped me be more successful by turning in work on time. Both public speaking and organization will definitely benefit me throughout my college year.

Overall, my AVID class was a huge opportunity to master new experiences, and indeed, I changed as a person and I owe it all to this class. Especially my community service taught me a valuable lesson to get involved with more people and help those in need because I grow as a person myself. I have achieved organization, presentation, and critical thinking skills and many more to be victorious all through college and even in the future.