Torie+D’s+Final+AmEx+2014+Speech

=Title of Speech=

"Unreal Expectations"

=Text of Speech=

Whether Americans are aware of it or not, it has been there since the beginning. Parents have thought about it when their kids were born, trying to pre-determine the future as they stared at the tiny infant in their arms. As their kids get older, it begins lurking around the corner of their brains, but they dismiss it; it's not important right now. By their freshman year, it starts pushing towards the forefront of their minds, demanding to make its presence known. School begins to focus on its importance, parents and coaches start nagging. Before they know it, they begin thinking about it incessantly, and it begins influencing what they do. Before they know it, it will be upon them. This “it” is college, or more specifically, top universities. In America today, there is a lot of pressure put on students by parents, teachers, coaches, and just society in general regarding college. We have probably all been told throughout our lives that we must go to a top college; get an outstanding education in order to get an important well-paying job, which will lead, hopefully, to being successful. If you don't, according to American society and as the father in the video clip Mr. Geib showed us about the boy that was rejected from every college he applied to said, "you will amount to nothing." But as a junior-almost senior- looking into the process of choosing and applying for colleges, it seems easier just to say "forget this", attend VC, get enough credentials to get an ok job, buy a cheap house, and live a manageable life. It doesn't sound completely terrible, but I want to go to college, go someplace new, have the college experience, live in the dorms, study the classes that I want based on what I want to major in. However, I am finding that it is proving to be more difficult than it should. Colleges in America have a vision of their ideal student that, honestly, most of us don't fill. Colleges want the students who are ASB president, captain of their sports teams, actively involved with various community service organizations, a top student with a 4.9 GPA and a score of 2400 on their SAT. I knew someone who has a friend who is an amazing volleyball player. I remember, my freshmen year, I was told that she had numerous colleges interested in her and had full ride scholarships being thrown at her left and right. I had said, "Wow! That's great! So she's a senior?" The person I was talking to responded with, "no, she's only a freshman, like us." That's great for her, but I'm sure for the rest of us, we don't have it that easy. She’s the stereotypical student of what colleges are looking for. But the majority of us don't fit that stereotype. To American universities, we are merely just a number. They don’t care about who we are as a person and our personality. I've been working with one of my coaches about finding good colleges with good rowing programs. She was a college rowing coach and rowed in a college program, so she has a lot of great insight on different rowing colleges. I come up with a list of colleges I am looking into and give it to her, and she will then give me advice about the colleges I have selected based on what she feels is the best college for me. She will tell me, “That’s a good school, but I think you can do better.” “This is a great school, awesome rowing program.” “I don’t think this school would be a good fit for you.” “Have you considered this college? I think it would be a good fit for you.” She knows my GPA and my SAT scores, as well as my erg times and splits for rowing, but she also takes into consideration what type of person I am, what my skill level is as rower and as a student. Recently, I applied for, and ultimately got denied from, an online scholarship. I was disappointed, but not surprised. Filling out the application, I was made aware of how seemingly insignificant I was to colleges. The application presented questions such as “What clubs are you involved in and what position do you hold?” “Are you a part of leadership, and what position do you hold?” “Are you in any sports? How are you ranked?” “What community service organizations are you involved with and how many times a week do you volunteer? For how many hours?” “How many honors/AP classes have you taken?” Here are my responses: For clubs, I’m just a participant. I’m not a member of ASB. I’m not team captain of the rowing team. As for community service, I don’t have a main organization I am involved with. Most students, including me, don’t have the time during the week to spend hours doing community service. And finally, this is my first year taking any sort of Honors/AP classes, so AP US History and AP English are the only ones. Seems just like the type of application that colleges would just pass over. Questions like these reveal how many titles you don't have, and how “normal” and “insignificant” you are. It doesn’t say anything about my personality. It doesn’t express the dedication I have to my classes and my sport. It doesn’t express my interests and what i like to do in my free time. Because of colleges’ high standards for their potential students, students are left feeling insecure about themselves; thinking that they aren’t good enough and everything that they do doesn’t matter. How many times do students do things that they don’t necessarily want to do, like community service, but do it just because it will look good on a college application? Students feel the pressures not only for getting into a college, but also paying for their education. Why do American colleges have to be so expensive? The cost of going to college is way too high. For example, most of the colleges I am looking at are about $40,000 per year. I know there is probably no way that my family and members of the working class can afford that. In my opinion, the United States government should cover the cost of college admission. The government pays for elementary schools, middle schools, and high schools so why not colleges? This way, students would be able to go to their dream school that they got accepted into and not have to go to a community college just because they can't afford it. Sure, there is financial aid and student loans, but what good are they if they plunge students into massive amounts of debt? I know I don't want to spend years of my life trying to dig myself out of the hole my education put me in, and I don't want to have to work 2 or 3 jobs at a time to get my student debt paid off so it won't plague me for the rest of my life. In the America I wish to see in the future, I want college to be more easily accessible to students. I want school to perhaps lower their standards of the "perfect student" to one that includes a larger range of students. I want colleges to not be so expensive, and I don't want to see students spend half their adult lives trying to pull themselves out of debt. I want to see the students of America going to school because they want to, not because they feel like they need to in order to be successful. I want to see students going where they want to go, not because it’s a top school, but the best school, the right fit for them. In the future, I want students to feel free to go to college and achieve a better education, rather than feeling the weight of all the pressures colleges have placed on them.

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