Am I a School Person?

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Erik Slott

Doctor Linda Beckham

English 1301 Composition

09 August 2006

Am I A School Person?

Some people enjoy going to school. I enjoyed going to school, but for the wrong reasons. People go to school to receive an education, to come out at the end of their four year journey more mature and adult. I went to school to drink, party like it was going out of style, and then to get an education. Finally one day I asked myself “Am I a school person?”. It was half way through my sophomore at Southern Illinois University. SIU was know little for academics and more for the crazy parties and crazy people, which I knew was the main reason to attend.

School was never really my thing. I can always remember being little and reading. I didn’t read like most little kids read, I read compulsively. Everyday, a new book, cover to cover then on to the next. Next came sports, I was always very active. Soccer, football, and basketball were my three main sports when I was younger. Throughout elementary school I remember reading, a lot. When I entered middle school the reading thing ended. Not completely, but sports took over. Also I started noticing girls more, which also took up a good chunk of my time when I wasn’t playing sports. Then came high school. High school to me was like the pre-game before the big party, the big party being college. Most kids high school “pre-game” consisted of studying and doing well in class. Not for me, mine consisted of women, three sports, and school when I had a spare minute. I slept in class, and when I was not sleeping I was mostly joking around with other people and not really paying

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attention. This is were I developed my great studying habits. I never failed courses, but I always preformed way below my standards in class.

Then came college, the big party. I still can’t decide if it was the greatest thing to happen to me, or the worst. No one breathing down my back to do work, I can drink seven days a week and no one would argue with me. I live in a building with all new friends, this is great. I thought to myself “Now I need to make my schedule for class, no Monday or Friday classes”. The first year went ok. I’d never received an A before in a class, but I did in my macro economics course. But the thing was, I didn’t study and I was a huge procrastinator. I was worried that next year would be much harder because of my great studying habits I had developed. Sophomore year came to a start. I’d often find myself going to class half drunk from partying the night before. Falling asleep during lectures, my notes were more like a big scribble pad then studying tools. The thing is, I tried to change. It tried studying, taking good notes, but none of it worked. My attention was always easily diverted. It’s