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Mathematics

by Rebekah Salazar

My parents brought it to my attention

that no matter how old we are, every single

person contributes to make the world go round.

As a student I had constantly distinguished

school as my job considering more than half my

life had been spent inside the walls of a school.

A number of times Ive been told success cant

be met without education. At home rewards for

good grades were promised but rarely given.

My motive to do well in school was easy. There

wasnt much to do rather than complete every

assignment on time with no exceptions. It didnt

dawn on me how different I would look at

school for the next four years of my life until I

became a freshman at Joliet West High School.

There was only one class keeping me

from maintaining all As and Bs for as long as I

can remember. It was a class in the corner of

the hallway, upstairs E building. That was my

geometry class for the next school year. Every

single day I sat on the right side of the room

with my pencil and paper. The only problem

was my attention span at that exact point every

day was not the best. Eighth period felt endless,

not to mention how negligent I displayed my

presence while Mrs.Vail explained the notes on

the board.

Each week we were assigned

homework on a daily basis. I would come home

to a sheet of notes my own hand wrote but my

mind couldnt comprehend. Of course the

announcement to stay after school for tutoring

went from one ear out the other. It was only

obvious the reason for my falling percentage in

geometry. Math became a lost cause as much

as I wanted to deny it. I continued my freshman

year struggling to maintain a letter grade I

never imagined would be imprinted on my

transcript. On the last day of school I

conscientiously gave myself a C in the class with

my outstanding strategy to understand the

language of math.

For my upcoming sophomore year

there was no doubt in my mind Algebra 2 would

be almost impossible to pass if I repeated my

past experience in math. Well at least this was

my initial thought arriving to class. It wasnt

until after school when I realized Mrs.Brannen

would be fortunate enough to teach my older

sister and me for the year 2011-2012. I cant say

I was content with the way my grades were the

past year so I was willing to create new habits

for myself. It was time to get my act together so

I could improve my grades in the future.

Initially on the second day of school

when all the real learning started I was ready to

put my best foot forward. My notes became

clearer as I paid attention to every step of eachequation. The numbers and symbols maintained

fresh in my memory as the day for my first test

arrived. The only reason for that was my

repetitive study habits throughout the morning

of the test. Once I finished the test and

rechecked my answers I felt eager to receive my

grade as soon as possible.

After school meeting up with Miriam,

there was one thing on my mind. How did shethink she did on the test? Im not even worried

about it I know I got a 100, math is so easy.Her

confidence was always over exaggerated in my

opinion but I tried not to let it phase me. From

one test to the next her grade would somehow

be higher than mine. I did my part though; I

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even stayed after school and in during advisory

for extra help. But for some reason I couldnt

get a perfect score on my tests the way

Miriams grades often were.

I had miraculously maintained an A thewhole year but I had yet to accomplish one last

thing. The last test day was a Friday. I studied so

much the night before that I finished my test

with thirty minutes to spare. Those thirty

minutes were spent: plugging equations,

rereading questions, rereading my answers, all

this just to assure no mistakes would be left

unfixed. After eighth period I walked into Mrs.

Brannens room, she was searching for my ID

number down the list. I left the class with my

head held high and the numbers twenty one

out of twenty behind my satisfied expression.