The Cornerstone of My Academic Success by Martha

The Cornerstone of My Academic Success by Martha - June 2024 Scholarship Essay

“College will be the first time I need to be in an actual classroom,” I remember telling a fellow homeschooler. To someone with an outside perspective, this statement may seem shocking. Does the lack of a classroom environment put homeschoolers at a disadvantage? Are they able to interact with their peers despite not seeing them on a daily basis? And does the comparatively minimal structure when it comes to schedules in their lives lead to issues regarding responsibility and deadlines in college?
Despite being homeschooled my whole life and never participating in an academic class of any kind until ninth grade, I still managed to excel in my online high school classes. Additionally, I also earned twenty-seven college credits as a high school junior and senior via online college classes and now plan on aiming for a double major in college. It is safe to say that I have had a successful academic life. However, this is due not only to my formal education but also my informal education. Through my lifestyle as a homeschooler, I have received additional education through experiences and gained social intelligence; on top of that, I have been given a sense of independence and personal responsibility through my schedule. All three of these aspects of informal education play into my academic success.
Homeschool curriculums, particularly science courses, often emphasize the ability to learn academic principles in everyday life. My chemistry textbook would point to simple examples such as cleaning supplies to demonstrate principles I was reading about. However, I also learned about academic principles through activities such as gardening or baking with my mom. By personally how plants grow towards the sun, for instance, I was able to understand the laws of science in a deeper way at a young age. Baking taught me similar things, such as what gluten is and how to make it, and also equipped me to to understand nutrition and how to keep my mind and body nourished. In a very direct way, this plays into the academic success I have experienced.
Additionally, listening to the conversations of my three older siblings and my parents helped shape my mind. I soaked up the cultural, political, historical, and philosophical knowledge they discussed. This laid the foundation for learning about these topics more in depth during my high school years. Finally, doing the simplest things such as watching sports with my dad sharpened my mind and memory: my younger brother and I made it a goal to remember every player’s position, name, and number, and my dad explained the statistics that would pop up on the screen. While these activities may not seem directly academic, they exercised my mind and instilled a love of learning.
My lifestyle equipped me not only with academic education, but also social and emotional education. Society has claimed that homeschoolers are unsocialized and unprepared to deal with personal interactions. But when properly done, homeschooling not only forms students with social skills, it also provides them with the skills to handle a variety of social situations. I was exposed to people from a range of ages almost constantly. I was around my siblings and parents daily, near other families at our church, and made friends with people both younger and older than me. I lived these experience because I was not in a classroom or school only with people my own age; instead, I interacted with a variety of people and was equipped to enter our wide-ranging society because of this.
Finally, my free schedule allowed me to work around my own needs and provide myself with a healthy balance of activities within daily life. When I was middle-school aged, my education consisted of a list of subjects my mother provided me with. I was given the freedom to do my subjects in whichever order I thought best. This quickly taught me which subjects required the most time to complete, how to best order them, and what times of day my mind was most active. Eventually, I integrated this knowledge into my high school life during my scheduled online classes. I understood which assignments to prioritize and how much time to spend on each. This also carried over to my dual enrollment classes; I was challenged by my college classes, yet in a healthy way. Learning to balance all my classes and meet my deadlines took determination and careful thought, but my previous academic experiences helped me rise to the challenge.
My academic success rests on a foundation of both formal and informal education. The skills and knowledge my informal education have provided me with will carry my not only through college, but also through my career and personal life. These skills have set me up for excellence and success. In learning through experiences, I have retained information in a deep way. In gaining social skills, I have learned to navigate this world and apply my academic knowledge. And finally, managing my own schedule taught me how to optimize my academic opportunities. As I move on in life and begin college, I am eager continue learning not only through my classes, but also through my informal education. It has been the cornerstone of my academic success.