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Nakia Wortherly-Foye Miss.E ENG 1101 062 10 September 2013 Failing My Way to Success: A Personal Literacy Narrative

When I was younger I truly believed the purpose of going to school was to learn what the teacher taught me so I could be smart, eventually get a job, and live successfully. I came to realize my most memorable encounters were not even by academic intent, I have the military lifestyle to blameor thank. Seriously, dont get me wrong, being a military kid in itself has its perks: a parent being deployed, having 24 hour duty, and an inconvenient work schedule all do not compensate for the medical benefits. I will say, however, the life experiences that come with being a military child is what makes it all worthwhile. In fact, the whole going to school attitude was such an embedded mentality that it was not until I moved to Fayetteville, NC that I realized how much an academic skill, such as writing, could be influenced by so many non-academic factors. My senior year of high school was literally the death of my Grade Point Average. I managed to stay in the top ten percent of my class; while my GPA was suffering, my writing experience was growing. Here is why: the second day of school after an hour and twenty minutes of playing hangman and throwing paper balls across the room we hear Hey guys! Guess Im gonna be teaching you cac-a-lis. - already I could not take my AP Calculus teacher seriously Mrs. Dwyer did not hesitate to mention to us that she had not seen cac-a-lis since college and will be learning it along with us. For consecutive days until the end of the year I had a routine

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which started with my favorite teen series, Perfect Chemistry by Simone Elkeles; the clich story of a rebel gangbanger, Carlos, and his pursuit at their schools pretty, rich girl, Brittany. I strut down the hallways lined with old gold and navy blue lockers, I wave my hand in the air to teachers with welcoming smiles standing at their doors like my parents do when we have guests over, get to room B8 and see my teacher standing there. Her face is unlike her colleagues, it reeked of uncertainty. I walk into class and take the seat three from the right, next to the door and in the front row. I open my purse, pull out the black covered bound world of teenage excitement, and pick up on the page I last left off. Dwyer tuned out, Carlos and Brittany tuned in. After the dreadful battle between letting my grade sink and getting lost in the world of the gang banger and hopelessly romantic white girl, I forgot about it all in the guidance office, better known as home. Same routine everyday as well, I walk in, and immediately get to work as a peer helper. Class changes are the best time to come to the guidance office because everyone will be trying to go to class, right? Wrong. After taming the crowd I work my way down the brightly lit hallway of counseling staff announcing my presence by belting out a big Heyyy Yall! As the period goes by I make my way into each counselors office when another peer helper is assisting a student with what they need. I talk to each counselor about something different: Mrs.Walker is for guys, Mrs.Craig is for scholarships, Mrs.Henderson wants her daughter to dress like me so we talk about fashion, and Mrs.Van Dyke is my cheerleading coach so we talk about cheerleading and girly stuff. Although they are adults and are pretty much my overseers I built bonds with them that are still holding strong today. Now, for the big Kahuna of the guidance office, the lady in charge, the one who can get your stuff straight or take as long as she wants to do it, Ms.Sanders. Ms.Sanders is a short, stout, light-skinned lady with a short haircut. Theres something about them that intimidates people I suppose. I remember looking at my schedule and

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having a mini heart attack when seeing that I would be a peer helper under her. But as the semester progressed I came to see that this hateful lady with a tough exterior that kids talk about all the time is really a 9-11 survivor who has a loving soul and genuinely cares for students, or maybe Im biased because were from the same part of New York. The experience in the Guidance office taught me all about being relatable to people of all ages and opened my perspective on the way they view teenagers, literature and our society which in turn became very helpful when I had to read complex literature in English that involved an adult narrator, or characters in the story who are very important and seemingly unreadable like Ms.Sanders. Speaking of the devil, my AP Lit class was Hell when I first got in there. I never did my readings; therefore, I never got to participate in the class discussion, and my grade went downhill from there. Basically, if you didnt do the homework, you didnt learn anything. So my whole theory of coming to school to learn was blown out of the water, and soon realized most of my learning would take place outside of the classroom. I only came to class to collect tools to add to my tool box with no instruction manual. One day I got interrupted from reading in my Calculus class to get called down to the library. I hurriedly packed up my things and rushed out of B8, around the corner, down the hall and into the library doors. My mouth dropped at the horrifying sight of my AVID teacher who is currently my God mother and my AP Lit teacher sitting together watching me walk into the trap they elaborately set up. I walked slowly contemplating what they could be doing here together Maybe Im getting an award! I thought, Or not. The look on their faces told me enough. The closer I walked up, the more apparent it became an intervention. They preached to me about how my grade in AP Lit was putting me in jeopardy of graduating, and as a senior it seems like all you have to look forward to is graduation. I thought to myself, Im not doing so hot in Cac-a-lis, ahem, I mean Calculus either! A tear rolled down

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my face; it was filled with pain, fear, and disappointment. I then realized if I wanted to graduate I needed to start acting like it. Weeks after the intervention I pulled my grade up by reading the novels and doing the readings as far as homework grades go. But I came to realize my AP Lit class had very little to do with your comprehension of literature, but how well you can relate to the characters and their situations. For example, we read an excerpt about a military soldier being deployed called Interchapter VII. This response was the break in my AP Lit success. Every prompt after that related to my life in some way. It seemed like they were targeted at me, there was a Ms.Sanders, a Mrs.Dwyer, a confidant Mrs.Walker in every story which I read. It then enabled me to comprehend the story better; thus, increase my chances of successfully addressing all parts of the prompt. I had never felt like I failed so much in my life until my senior year of high school. My first semester grades were trash, but I somehow managed to pull it together by the time graduation came around. Looking back, the only reason I felt like I failed was because society has us in this mindset that if we arent well rounded, we wont be successful. But I was successful; because my writing skills increased so dramatically, my failed attempts at other things made my writing experience that much more rewarding. Afterall, youd think most of your substance as a writer happens in a strictly academic setting; However, our style, diction, syntax and overall attitude toward writing comes mostly from our experiences outside of an English classroom.