Finding Purpose

1)      Despite having my own reasons to come to school, my parents and other external sources have shown me alternate reasons to come to school.

a.       My parents want me to come to school because they want me to be educated. They want me not to just pass, but also be among the best. They believe that being among the top in all subjects is the key to success. Also, it is something for them to brag about to their friends who also have children my age. So, it also comes down to a matter of competition because to the average immigrant parent, their child’s grade determines where they stand in society.

b.      My culture, although it has qualities that are not vibrant in Canada, still strictly focuses on people’s success and literacy. My culture puts people in their places and positions in their lives based on grades and success. If I were to stay with my culture, I would need to get amazing grades, be successful and wealthy. If I wanted to choose my life partner from my cultural background, marriage is only an option when I have high grades and a clearly bright future. So, culture wants me to go to school because without success, and education, people will look down on you and less people will support you. Thus, overall, it is all about respect and recognition.

c.       My friends have also given me multiple reasons to come to school. This is because there is no other place for us to build a strong friendship through cooperation and hard work. School is also a major factor that brings friends together and keeps them close together. Thus, my peers are also a reason why I come to school.

2)      Although there is pressure from family and culture, I generally ignore their expectations and look up to my goals and expectations. I come to school because I want to find out how I will be successful. I want to know what area of knowledge and work fits me the best. I want to find out what interests me the most and what I am the best in. Thus, I come to school because it balances out my choices and shows me which career I should take that would make me the most successful.

My grades are quite good, in my opinion anyways. My average is around 92 at school. I have subjects which I am really good at: Careers (<100), Biology (95), History (94), Mathematics (94-97; undecided by teacher), and French (95). Then, there are subjects that I am mildly good at: Computer Science (around 90), Interdisciplinary Studies (82), English (>84). My grades are like this because although I spend so much effort in certain subject areas, I reduce my focus in other subject areas. Thus, I am inconsistent. If I used more energy and study time, my lower grades would catch up with the higher ones, hence increasing my overall performance. Also, I tend to become lethargic. So, I lose my ability to use all of my skills and potentials to perform incredibly in each subject area.  If I had put all of my effort to work, I could have achieved an over 95 average. Thus, I conclude that I am pleased (for now) with my grades but not fully satisfied because I know that I can do a lot better than what I already achieved at school.

3)      I am obviously unsatisfied with certain results of my performance during this school year, but I think I improved a lot from last year. Last year, most of my grades were in the 80s and some were in the low 90s. My average was around 88 in Grade 9. I was not satisfied, especially considering so many of my peers being better than me. However, this year in Grade 10, although I did not put in 100% effort into my work, I still worked harder and managed to achieve a lot better in grades as compared to last year. My average rose by a lot and I am much better than most of the friends who did better than me last year. So, I am proud of myself. Also, this allowed me to gain a lot more confidence and encouragement, meaning I am determined to put more effort into school in Grade 11. So, I achieved big this year although I am not fully satisfied.

4)      Since I am in Grade 10, within the next 4 years, I have a lot to achieve:

a.       Firstly, I want to gain an average over 95 to greatly increase my chances of getting into the best Universities in Canada

b.      Also, I want to get the highest grade in Biology and Mathematics because these are tools that will help me become a doctor

c.       I want to get into Life Sciences at UofT

d.      I want to get an average of over 95 at UofT to increase my opportunities of being a participant at Medical School