Personal narrative about an experience that impacted you involving your education - Essay Example

Academics was something that my parents put a great deal of pressure upon; they had invested a great amount of money for the purpose of my education and thus wanted me to excel more than I wanted to. I was never good in studies, but I always spent time trying to make my parents happy by trying my best to get good grades. The high school I attended had a number of clubs and associations attached with its prestigious name and as students we were always encouraged to be a part of them. There was one social service unit that did not have too many students as a part of it and thus the student body always urged students to join it in order to help the special children within the city.

However, the club was never able to attract a lot of attention towards itself because not everyone wanted to become a part of a social unit designed for the welfare of differently-abled children. My parents have always tried to help charitable organisations and young orphans to live a better life in whatever way they can; my mother has raised me teaching me little things like donating m old clothes and always taking food for orphans on festive occasions. These habits have been inculcated within me so deep that somehow someday, I was urged from within to join the social service unit in order to interact with differently abled children and understand how they lived lives.

With time, we were taken on field trips where we visited children from various schools; some of them were blind, some deaf, and some were physically handicapped. However, I remember meeting a young boy by the name of Austin, who was autistic. Soon, we had a three day older sibling program where we were each assigned a young boy or girl to foster and nurture under our care. We were to behave as their big brothers or sisters and teach them all kinds of values and morals and spend three days with them.

I was assigned as Austin’s brother. At first, I did not understand how to deal with the young boy because he always thought on a different wavelength – I was still not able to understand how to interact with Austin and by the end of the first day I felt frustrated and disappointed on having had him appointed with me. However, as the second day came and I wearily woke up to go meet Austin, I was surprised when he handed me a jigsaw that he had painted, cut up and made for me. He told me with his slurry speech that he had designed it on the story ‘Hansel and Gretel’ by the Grimm Brothers.

I was extremely touched. That day, I met Austin’s teachers as well and they showed me his skills and creativity. I was amazed to see that the boy had an amazing sense of art – his paintings were something different! His teachers also told me that despite his challenges, Austin spent hours at an end reading and being read to, trying to understand his texts and making sure that he did well in his studies, because his parents believed in him and told him that God would take his illness away if he studied hard and made something of himself.

His parents had raised him by telling him every day that his handicap was only a matter of perspective and that he was the only one who could change it by making himself smarter day by day. Those thoughts hit me like an impact as I thought to myself how lucky I was to be physically fit unlike Austin. However, despite his challenges, he was doing well in his studies and making excellent progress. Till today, I am grateful to Austin for