Educational Autobiography

Written by Tegan Sturdy

Tegan is a Junior at Tulane University, and this is the story of her educational experience.

In my time from kindergarten through 12th grade, I was a student in Cohasset Public School in Cohasset, Massachusetts. I had a very good education, my school promoted individualism, competition and independence. Everyone was expected to succeed and teachers pushed their students to reach their fullest potential. Being in a very progressive and liberal state, I had an education that reflected many of these ideals, and as a public school, religion and culture didn’t influence my schooling. In Cohasset I struggled for a long time to succeed and often felt very behind my peers, but this usually only pushed me to work harder and being in a very small public school I was able to make connections with my teachers who cared and helped me to continue to work hard. Once I reached college and met people for the first time who did not share the same upbringing with me, I was shocked to see the difference in education that people received. Now that I attend a top private university I no longer compete against those who had a basic public school education. Instead I look around and see kids from top boarding schools and private schools all across the nation whose schools were well funded and were able to afford top of the line science equipment, teachers, and new gyms. Meanwhile for the first time I no longer felt confident in prior schooling. Suddenly when looking back on my first 12 years in school I see the lack of AC, heating, uniforms, teachers and help and feel that I was put at a disadvantage. While more times than not I was very well supported by my teachers and staff I also did experience the occasional bad teacher who did the bare minimum if even some days. Few teachers were older and had tenure and no longer cared to teach or did anything about the fact that we were all struggling in the class. However, now the teachers that cared about me have created a much more lasting effect than the rest. For instance in the 8th grade I started learning Algebra II, and quickly began to struggle in math in a way that I had never had to deal with before. I stayed almost every day after school trying to learn the content and even then I barely made it through the class with a C+, the lowest grade I have ever received in a class. But the teacher was always there to help me, he gave me extra practice, and retaught the lesson to me in more detailed steps. Even once I reached high school everytime I ran into him he would ask about me and my classes and became somewhat of a mentor to me. Finally my senior year while walking around the hallways avoiding a class I dreaded sitting in, I ran into my 8th grade algebra teacher and per-usual we struck up conversation, we talked about where I wanted to go to college, how sports were, if I was gonna sail in college, and everything else. Even then 4 years after having him teach me he still cared about my education and still wanted to see me succeed. This teacher and several others who I often spoke with still impact me today and have played a large role in me choosing to go into education. I hope that like them I can create a lasting effect on students. In my own experience I felt that my personal experience definitely played a role in cultivating equity, my school did its best for all students to allow for equal opportunity and being state funded there were many programs to help aid students who could not afford certain things including school lunches.