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Overcoming Adversity

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Submitted By tylercharles
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I used to think that I was “all that.” In elementary school and middle school I didn’t have to work hard and was able to get good grades without putting forth a lot of effort. My personal philosophy was that if I worked hard in class during the school day, then when I got home from school, my time should be my own. I had been successful following this belief system for years, and then, I enrolled in AP World History (APWH) in the tenth grade. My experiences in APWH changed my entire outlook on my role as a student and caused me to reevaluate my perspective on the things that were important to me.

I had heard that APWH was going to require a lot of work, but I was sure that it would be no different than any other honors level class that I had taken. I received an assignment to complete during the summer. I started the work, but it was so boring that I never finished the readings. When school started, and the teacher began to give daily quizzes based on the summer readings, I knew I was in trouble. I started to fall behind due to the amount of time required to complete each assignment. I knew I wasn’t off to a good start of the school year. My grade began to tank and I was unable to keep up with the pace of this class.

The downward spiral of my grades in APWH affected my other classes also. As I spent more time trying to bring up my grade in this class, my grades began to suffer in my other classes. I decided to make a drastic change. I needed to quit playing football to focus on my classes. At the time, I was one of the star players on the Junior Varsity team. When I told the coach the reason why I was quitting the team during the middle of the season, I could tell right away that he didn’t agree with my decision. Instead of giving me support and encouragement, he decided to humiliate me. Before practice started, I had to tell my teammates that I was quitting.

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