Yet Life Goes On

If you have followed this blog for any amount of time you already know that one of my avocations arose from one of my vocations. I was a "reader" for a city school district which meant that I read essays assigned by various teachers and gave comments, instructions, and advice. Originally that task only involved reading essays and putting in marginal notes but eventually the teachers came to rely on me for more tasks. Ultimately I offered students the opportunity to be tutored for free if they felt they needed the help and if they thought they could put up with me on a one to one basis.

While you might think that I would be overrun by students who wanted extra tutelage for free, that was never the case. There are a variety of reasons for that including the innate ennui of high school students, but over the years there were many students who availed themselves of my help. Some of those ended up leaving after only a few sessions, some came more often than their schoolwork demanded, some used me as a relief valve for the pressures of their day to day lives. I augmented my free tutelage for those students who stuck with my program, offering free advice about college application essays. I always tell people that I have been admitted to every single top rank college in the nation.

Don't misunderstand--I never wrote a student's essay. I never invented non-existent accolades. But I made suggestions (when one student asked if she could mention her baby blanket in her essay I suggested that she talk about packing for college and considering taking it with her. She ended up writing an amazing essay that didn't even need much editing.), I gave advice about what not to write about, I told them to be honest and lyrical rather than trying for ostentation.

Anyway, the point of all of this is that there are numerous young people who still keep in touch with me, not because I cheated for them but because I showed them how to tell a story about themselves that was honest without braggadocio. This week one of those students, who graduated Yale a few years ago, told me he had just been accepted to Harvard Law School. Of course right now, Harvard Law School will be taught through distance on-line learning so this fellow who has been working for the Fed in DC will be living in his parents' home and taking Harvard Law School classes online.

Congratulations and felicitations to all those who still believe in the dream.