I'm SO embarrassed.

When I was looking for a good college program to go into last year, I came across Web Development at St. Clair College. That's a low-key college here in Windsor; affordable and offers just the program I wanted. It focuses mostly on web development (HTML, Javascript, etc.) but also goes a bit into graphic design. The only requirement to get accepted in this program is you have to have at least a 70% in english. So, here I am just as happy as a clam because english is my best subject. At least it was for grades 9 through 11. Now here comes grade 12 and guess what I have in english? Actually, don't guess because it's too embarrassing to even say out loud let alone post on the internet. Let's just say, if I don't focus all my time on english I will not be going to college in the fall. I'll be back in high school for a 5th year which is second on my 'list of things I really don't want to do but might have to' (first being getting a flu shot. Have I ever mentioned how deathly afraid of needles I am?).

All of the essays I've been getting back, she's given me a 2+
First of all, are we in grade school still? Grading our 12th grade essays usually a leveling system of numbers 1-4?
Anyways, a 2+ is about a 60-65% and below provincial standard.

The marks were getting on our report card on Monday are our mid-term marks, so I still have some time to bring up my grade and I have english all year (thank God!) so I'm sure I'll be fine by March/April (when I actually apply for college).

I'll have to be honest though, I've sort of noticed my writing plateauing. My spelling, grammar and vocabulary should be improving as I get older but when I went back and read some things I wrote in grade 10 english and even grade 9 english, my writing isn't much better.
I don't know whether to blame that on my past english teachers or myself, but either way, I know I need to improve.

This was a real eye opener I need to focus on my english more so than my other subjects. I go from having nothing lower than an 80% is all my three years of english to having a grade of .. well, a grade that will not get me into college.

I've come up with a few things I can do to help improve not only my english mark, but my writing in general:

1. READ!
-I haven't read any books on my own for over a year. The only books I've read are the ones they force you to read in class and none of the books we read in class really appeal to me so I don't end up really reading them. Just skimming them and basically using Spark Notes for chapter summaries.

2. Do my homework before the night it's due
-We always get at least a week's notice before an essay paper is due but I tend to always wait to write it the night before it's due. So I hardly have time to proof read, edit or make it actually good. Granted, the essay topics she's given us are extremely lame and don't inspire me at all. We have an essay due this week and the topic is 'explain a time when you were bullied' or 'explain a time when you went along with something you knew was wrong'.
-.-

I was bullied in grade school, I mean, who wasn't?! But the times were insignificant and not even worth talking about. I never let it affect me and it wasn't all that bad. I'm an independent person and if someone bullied me, I'd go find someone else to be around.
Sure, bullying hurts and it can really tear a person apart, but I'm not one of those people. When I think of my years growing up, being bullied aren't in those memories.

Ok, now for a time when I did something I knew was wrong. Well, this is just ridiculous, like I'm really going to write about doing something illegal.
But I think she wants us to focus more on bullying, like if someone was being bullied and you knew it was wrong but you never did anything to stop it or maybe you the bully. But honestly, I'm not a bully. I never bullied anyone purposely. Of course there are times when you say something and it comes out wrong or you never meant to hurt someones feelings, but for me to intentionally do something to hurt someone else? I'm sorry but that is just not how I am or how I was raised.

There were some girls throughout grade school who were teased but I always either ignored it or befriended them. I know ignoring bullying is wrong but I didn't like this girl anyways, so at least I didn't go ahead and bully, right?
But this one girl who was a real drama queen was bullied mildly and only because she brought it upon herself (she lied and cried a lot) but she was my friend since I was 4 and was really my friend. So when other girls didn't want to be friends with her, I still played with her at recess and went to her house after school. But then she switched schools.. without even telling me haha
she wasn't my best friend but honestly, you'd think she'd clue me in!

I'm sure I'll be able to come up with something with those essay topics, but I don't think I'll really be using any personal experiences unless I want another 2+