High School has been one of the most important landmarks in my life. My name is Ahliyah Williams. I am a senior at Dr. Henry A. Wise Jr. High School in Upper Marlboro, Maryland. These special years of my life included my development as a person, challenging educational encounters, preparing for post-secondary options, and bettering myself for real-world situations. This essay will explain the journey of my high school experience as being a student-athlete. I have been at my most vulnerable times in high school. Equally important, I obtained my best memories throughout the four years of attending this school. In my high school career, I thankfully changed into the woman that I hope to be for the rest of my life.
It was on a Tuesday morning at 5:30 AM. I woke up early, made breakfast, and got ready. Never before have I made sure that I looked so presentable in my life. I felt unstoppable because I knew that I was a day closer to being in the real world. Little did I know that I had many obstacles to go through to develop me into the “adult” that I thought I had already become. Going through the doors, I didn’t know what to expect. Is high school like the movies? Would I get bullied? Knowing that high school was a totally different ball-game than what middle school was, I expected nothing but the worst.  I started high school as a shy freshman in a bright gold shirt. The shirts that we had to wear made me even more anxious to be seen by the huge crowds of upperclassman.

As sophomore year begin to approach, never had it felt better to get out of gold and go into the black uniforms. I truly begin to not care about the important things like school. All I wanted to do was have more friends and more fun. Even though it felt good to be a grade higher, there was still something missing. With me being the intelligent girl that I am, I began to slowly but surely make better decisions for myself. The sense of maturity that everyone is supposed to gain by age 16 came right on time. Eleventh grade was my hardest year by far. Never had I felt more lost in my life. The pressure from my parents, teachers, and even my coach started to rain on me. Anxiety from freshman year slowly emerged its way into my junior year. Reality began to strike on me like lightning with tests, quizzes, and exams. I realized I had to grow up fast in order to face the real world. One of the first steps that I had to take was getting over my immaturity and anxiety. I forced myself to overcome many things that I would never get myself into. Something as simple as going to the grocery store by myself or ordering food; is something that I now enjoy.
In my senior year, now I have become accustomed to the guidelines and rules that are expected from the senior class. Balancing school and sports can be stressful but has its benefits. I have gained the important skill to be able to multitask. This trait has given me advantages in the most beneficial ways. Multi-tasking is the key to the twenty-first century with all the technology used. I know now that the obstacles that were thrown my way have changed me for the best.

Turning in work on time has definitely been one of my most difficult educational experiences. I usually find it hard to keep up with the work that I have due.  This seems to be because of my bad organization skills. In eleventh grade, final grades were going in. Unfortunately, because of my work patterns, some assignments wouldn’t be turned in when it was supposed to. Because of that small mistake, my grades could have been much different. The lack of organization made it often hard for even my teachers to put my grades in when they were supposed to. Unfortunately, this has affected many of my grades throughout my high school career. In college, professors will not accept late work most of the time. This is because with becoming older, should come responsibility. I accept the challenge of improving this problem. I am working on improving my organization skills by using folders and dividers in my notebook. Another thing that has greatly challenged me in school was AP Government class. I decided to take an Advanced Placement class because I figured that it would make me more studious and ready for college. In my regret, the class did the opposite. Since I was not applying myself like I should have, I got bad grades. My grade in AP class suffered more than any of my other grades.. Consequently, taking a class that was supposed to benefit me the most, affected me for the worst.

Lastly, studying is something that I will always have a difficult time doing. As I mature I realize that studying is a necessity that I should get used to before I go to college. College has been one of the biggest influences toward me studying more. I notice that studying helps me a lot when I do it. Whenever there is something important that I have to study for, I always try my best to be able to motivate myself to review it. Since the subject math is something that I find difficult to understand sometimes, it often has helped me out a lot to study my classwork and homework. Furthermore, as I increase my studying habits, I have done better on many assignments. Over the course of my educational years, I take studying more serious than ever before.

I always have known what I wanted to do in life. From age three, I had it all figured out that I wanted to be a Veterinarian. As I got older, I was always proud of telling people that is what I wanted to be. While everyone wanted to be a hairdresser or a photographer, I wanted to be a doctor. Entering high school definitely changed my perspective on my career choice. I often questioned myself because I didn’t want to change what I always wanted to do for my whole life. Also, it was getting down to the wire with time.
I was in my eleventh grade year when I suddenly chose something different to do with my life. It was very stressful. After researching careers, and being in classes like College Summit, it was soon realized that  becoming a Veterinarian wasn’t the right career choice for me. It was not only because my interest changed, but because of things like the salary. I have very high expectations for myself. I realized that even with the strenuous years that high-paid jobs have to endure, that is what I have to sacrifice in order to be happy. After I realized what I wanted to do, I turned to colleges that would be the best option for my career field. I began researching universities that had the best medical fields. Since then, I have been doing everything I can do to meet the requirements for colleges.

With being a sports medicine doctor, it is required to first get a bachelor’s degree and then a doctorate. I knew that I wanted to start to get good grades early because in medical school I will need to get exceptional grades. Thankfully I have gained the knowledge early that if I wanted to have a nice living, I needed to put the work in. My grades begin to raise the more focused I became. Taking my work more seriously was something that I had to put before anything. I cut more excuses and began to earn honor roll every quarter. Now since my grades have improved tremendously, it is easier for me to freely choose many colleges without worrying. When i got my mind right, I became unstoppable. Now in senior year, I plan to get my best grades by far.

Helping people has always been something I have been interested in. Service hours are an important aspect of my high-school experience. I did not expect that when I attempted to get a couple service hours by giving cans of perishable food to the hungry, I would have wanted to become more involved in helping people. After donating food to people who needed it the most, I searched the web for more opportunities to help people who are struggling. Central Union Mission and National Coalition For The Homeless are two organizations that I have donated to. Even though I was not earning service hours, I was earning a lifetime of memories from random people who showed me, love. This experience has helped me to be able to contribute to the world. I am thankful that I have been able to make a change.

Early in my high school career, I felt bullied and intimidated in some ways. Those experiences had some negative effects, but ultimately the effects became positive. At one point, I started to do somewhat the same to someone else, and that made me feel even worse. Those bad feelings have given me a stronger sense of empathy and compassion than I never knew was within me. Not only do I affect many people in great ways now, but I have people who look up to me. My siblings, cousins, and younger teammates are people who I know admire what I do. I consider myself to be a big role model for many people. Now I do everything to my best ability so that the people who I love can follow my steps. I also want people to remember all the great things I did for them. This responsibility of being a leader will help me be able to mentor and cultivate different people’s growth and maturity.

This situation is relevant because a good citizen is naturally a good person. A good person knows right from wrong and does the right thing at the right time. If there is an accident on the road,  I would pull over and call the police. If I see a stop sign and no one else is on the street, I stop anyway. Good citizens do the right thing even when no one is watching. I have gained integrity from being a good leader and responsible citizen. My high school years included my development as a person, challenging educational encounters, preparing for post-secondary options, and bettering myself for real-world situations. I know a year from now I will be appreciating these special times of my life. In less than one hundred days, I will officially be a college student. I couldn’t say that I am not nervous, but I know that it will be an experience of a lifetime