It feels like just yesterday we were writing our first blog entries. At the time, I was a little shorter, a little more naïve, and I had full year of unfamiliarity to unravel. Now, here I am today writing my final blog entry—hopefully a little taller—with some of that naivety  replaced by the truth that comes with experience, and with two years of countless failures, numerous successes, and thirteen pretty incredible people to look back to.

More than the experiences themselves, however, I feel it was how we choose to deal with the experiences that gave us a holistic understanding of who we are today. If it weren’t for all our feedback sessions, for instance, I would have probably never recognized the harm I was doing myself when taking on so much work at a time. I would have probably never been encouraged by a group of people to start saying no, to challenge others. And on top of that, would I have recognized that most of the things I had to work on came from an even bigger underlying fear of disappointing others? Were it not for the IA, I would have probably drifted through my last two years in high school with the goal of simply achieving good grades, but never stopping to think whether those grades reflected me becoming a better student or a better person. 

So thank you for that, for giving me the time to really get to know myself and to recognize whether who I was aligned with the person I want to become.

The image of our first IA class still lives vividly in my mind. We were all sitting down on the floor, and Mr. Topf was talking about how money and grades act as extrinsic motivators for most people. He then made a point of asking us why some organizations are able to inspire and others are not. The answer lay in that people don’t buy what you do they buy why you do it, and those companies that are able to inspire had that why; they had a purpose. 

Being the first group of students in a pilot program was not easy; we were often told that we were taking the easy way out, that all we did was cut fruit or edit movies. But I think most of these things were said simply because the approach we had towards learning was different, and it’s easy to associate different with wrong because there’s comfort in doing what “everyone else does." At the end of the day, however, I also think the reason we were able to see past people’s comments, and the reason we didn’t really mind being the “outcast” of such a traditional paradigm of education, was because we had a clearly defined purpose in everything that we did, and more so, we had the freedom to speak up if we felt that at any point this purpose was lacking.

I think it’s fair to say that all thirteen of us - while being in the same program - have all had a completely distinct experience, and that’s because the autonomy we’ve been given has pushed us to take control of what we learn and how we choose to learn it. There’s been a lot of times where we’ve debated whether we have enough content in the IA, but as we go off to college, and we enter a world with less structure than we had in high school, I realize that more than content, it's important that we know how to deal with the uncertainties that life poses. And autonomy is often exactly that; it’s knowing how to take that uncertainty and mold it into an answer with reasoning.

At the beginning, one of the things that scared me the most about the IA was the fact that I was going to spend all day, three times a week, with the same 13 students—most of whom I didn’t even know very well. Now, it’s the one thing I’m most afraid of leaving behind. It hasn’t really hit me yet, and I think the moment it’ll hit is when I get to UF and I no longer have Corey’s room to walk into and shout, “Hey fart face” to Pedro sitting on the couch. We’ve been told endless times that relationships matter, but the IA has proven that for me. From the time we were filming our first “It’s story time!” videos, to the time we were all up (including Gonchi) until 4 am editing the documentary, or cutting fruit when BlendZ was just getting started, it’s crazy to think how much has happened within those four walls of Corey’s room, which has become like a second home with a second family. So thank you for that. I’m going to miss our way of being a whole yet always being individually unique. Were I to wind the clock back two years, I wouldn’t hesitate to choose the IA all over again. 

On Thursday night I read Madison's story. 

Madison Holleran's story; a 19-year-old that was "perfect" on the outside, but whose perfection consumed her on the inside. She was a state national soccer player who'd been recruited by Lehigh University on a scholarship, but who'd instead chosen to attend the University of Pennsylvania, where she'd been recruited for running. It was there where the pressure built up on her more than ever and "she lost the balance between being perfect - and trying to be perfect - and being happy."

On January 17th she climbed to the 9th floor of a parking garage in downtown Philadelphia and took a running leap. From her eyes, freeing herself from the pressure, but from the eyes of others, freeing herself from a distorted image of perfection that many only hope to achieve. 

Her story really hit me because I understand the immense pressure she felt, but I don't understand how it could reach a point to where her mind made her think it was worthy of her life. It's a thought that scares me because I too am a perfectionist. 

When I was small, I viewed it a lot more as a strength, it was like this fuel that gave me the magic powers to do anything. But as I've grown older, my responsibilities have grown, and so has the perfectionist that lies in me. The fuel runs like never before, but that's exactly the problem. I often feel as though I have the "magic powers" to do it all - and to do it well - even though I know that I don't. It's a whirlpool of mixed emotions, one where I usually put too much pressure on myself to reach "perfection", and when I don't, I stress out because it's not perfect. 

When I was in eleventh grade, I experienced that peak year of stress. I was in what I'd say was the most challenging year in terms of academics, and while I fought to maintain my grades, I also fought to maintain my involvement in everything that I had always done. But I was under such pressure that I developed an ulcer. That was a wake up call. It was a physical manifestation of my strive for perfection, and it had to end. 

The other day in class, we watched a video that talked about how a lot of us are always looking towards the future that we forget to live in the present. And I think that's what applies here. If the process of reaching perfection makes me feel so overwhelmed at times, than why am I trying to achieve it? It's basically like I'm changing in days of stress for just a single result. Is it really worth it? 

It is if what I'm working towards is something that I deeply value, but if it's not, I think it's an opportunity to settle for less than perfect. Settle for the point where the process is enjoyable, not just the product.

If you haven't read Madison's story, I think you should. 

It’s not a place, it’s more of a moment, an activity, one that some people hate, but for some odd reason I love. 

Running.

What’s kind of ironic is how much I used to hate it. My sister Gabriella would always insist that I run with her, but to me it was one of those things were your mind was focusing solely on finishing. When I started playing soccer, however, I pushed myself to run. I wanted to gain resistance to focus my mind less on surviving the game physically, and more on pushing through tactically. So I started waking up at 5:30 am. to go running. 

I did it three to four times a week, and the more I did it, the more I got into it. It went from being a sport I considered psychologically draining, to mentally stimulating. I don’t exactly know how or why that happened, but I think it’s somewhat related to two things that Bel Pesce mentioned in her TED talk: “5 ways to kill your dreams”. 

The first way: 

It’s something that I’d say happens to most of us; once we know that we’ve achieved our initial end product in mind, we settle for just that. Ms. Pesce, however, argues that settling for ok is never ok; when you’re growing towards a peak, you need to work harder than ever and find yourself another peak. That’s exactly it about running: it’s a constant challenge because growth is never guaranteed; growth is directly correlated to effort, and there are endless peaks to climb. The more you run, the better and faster you’ll get. Stop running, and well, you either stagnate or loose most of what you’ve worked up to. 

Thursday was an unforeseeably great day. I expected it to be sad; it was my last day as Ms. Caro's teacher assistant, and quite frankly, I wasn't ready to go. I wanted to surprise the kids with some cupcakes that I had made the night before, but when placed next to what they did, the cupcakes were really nothing at all; they planned a surprise goodbye party and handmade cards which I must admit lie proudly in my room. 

The star of the party was definitely Santiago; he was dancing and singing to reguetton, his face was as red as a strawberry, and his rapping skills were clearly under development. As most of us laughed at him, Yeun, one of the shyer students from class, came up to me and timidly untucked a card that she had folded into her right pocket. As my eyes ran through the first line, a deep feeling of kindness and affection flowed through my body and raced to my extremities. 

Now I've received cards before, but this was different. It was the fact that she had written it, and what she had written, that really ticked me...in a good way. Yeun's shyness mostly comes from that she is a new student who arrived to FDR knowing no English or Spanish - put me in her shoes and I would probably be the same way. During the practice presentation that she gave of her PYP Exhibition on Thursday, some of the students started laughing at her; they told her they couldn't hear or understand what she was saying. I could tell the humiliation was gradually building up in her. When she broke into tears, I brought her to the bathroom to try and make her feel better, but I'm afraid that I'm not the best when it comes to dealing with those types of situations. 

And that's why the card came as such a surprise to me. In it, she wrote about how much she had appreciated the moment in the bathroom, and explained that she was writing this because she didn't feel comfortable speaking about it. I know it sounds like something menial, but when one of the shyest students in the class does something like that, it means a lot because it shows you that they are analyzing what's going on around them. They may not be talking about it, but deep inside, they get it.  

What I want to emphasize is what the anecdotes represent, and that, to me, is the impact that a teacher can have on a student, and likewise, the impact that a student can have on a teacher. It's a mutualistic relationship, really. When I look at everything the kids planned...the party, the cards, the cheering in the parade, I like to think that I did impact them in one way or another. But when I look back at everything I learned from them, I come to think that they impacted me in so many more ways. Not simply because they gave me a glimpse of what the future as a teacher looks like, but because their energy F I L L E D me with energy, and I think that’s the absolute best and most important part of teaching.

It's once that student-teacher connection has been established that the "job" becomes more than just a "job". You begin sensing their energy, and their energy turns into purpose for you, purpose that goes beyond simply giving a kid a grade. Miss. Mattison pinpointed it in a comment she made on one of my previous blog entry: "you become their coach, not just in the academic sense, but with friendships, stress, learning to organize, priorities, etc.". If I think back to my childhood, I can easily remember the name of all of my teachers since EC4. Why? Because in some way or another they were all my coach for a year; a different coach for each different stage of my life. Getting the chance to be a coach with Ms. Caro's class, even if it was just for three weeks, has been one of the most rewarding experiences of my life. 

When my sisters were getting ready to go off to college, I vividly remember how swarmed they were with people asking them what they were going to study. At the time, I considered myself the observer—carefully listening to their answers, but never really daring to comment or question on their decisions.  

Little did I know that I would quickly step into my sisters’ position. From being the observer, I became the person being questioned. And while I thought I was going to like all the questioning, it actually turned into something a bit frustrating. 

And in just two weeks, I’ve not simply been able to support the kids as they work on their PYP Exhibition Project (one that I did in 5th grade as well!), but I’ve been able to help Ms. Caro find lesson plans to improve the kids surveying/interviewing skills. I’ve learned how to write interim report card comments, find worksheets to emphasize the learning of some of the concepts they’ve learned in math, and I’m currently in the process of planning my own math lesson that I’ll be teaching on Monday.

From everything I’ve experienced so far, the greatest struggle—and yet the part that I love the most—is the relationship that I am establishing with the kids. It’s a slow process, but I completely understand why. For them, suddenly having someone else in class to whom they can seek feedback and help from is not exactly easy, whereas for me, reaching out to the kids as their “teacher”, rather than another student is also hard because it's a different type of relationship. It’s one where I’ve learned from Ms. Caro that is a fine balance between being strict and having high expectations, to being understanding and creating an environment in which the kids look forward to coming to everyday. 

During a planning meeting that I went to with Ms. Caro and Ms. Rita (another 5th grade teacher), Ms. Rita explained how every teacher has her own teaching style. While Ms. Rita focuses more on the emotional development of her students, I find that Ms. Caro focuses more on the development of the students’ skills; a day in either of there classes would probably be very different, but that’s something that I love. It means the teacher has autonomy, and is therefore able to create a class that she sees value in. 

Something Ms. Caro told me was that one of the hardest aspects of teaching was the emotional attachment it involves. You sometimes see a kid struggle and struggle, and you do all you can to help, but helping them is not always in your hands. That’s when the emotional attachment kicks in, and it’s difficult to simply “walk away” from the problem because you know the kid is suffering, and while you can only do so much to help, you can't settle for "so much".  At the same time, however, I think that this emotional attachment is what makes teaching so gripping. The care you have for your students is what motivates you to give your best because you know that it can help them reflect their best.

This next week is going to be hard. Hard in that I’m going to be faced with the challenge of actually leading the classroom, but harder in that I’m going to have to say bye to the class right when I started to get to know them. I’m going to miss hearing the Condor News in the morning, I’m going to miss telling Santiago to calm down so that he doesn’t trip on his way out, and most importantly, I’m going to miss the excitement of entering Ms. Caro’s room knowing what to expect, but at the same time not really knowing what's going to happen.

This semester has been a little different from the rest. In the past, we could find comfort in planning for the “long term”—which to us meant the point up until when we’d graduate. But we never really planned what would happen once we reached that point? The long term for us now is what happens after we graduate, and thus, this semester we’ve been focusing thoroughly on wrapping things up. For the most part, wrapping BlendZ up.

For me, it’s crazy to see the transition of BlendZ from being just an idea to being an actual tangible business. Some of us have experienced entrepreneurship together with a lot of media, others have experienced it together with a lot finance, but all of us—regardless of our role—have experienced entrepreneurship with all its good, and also its bad.

When I look back at this semester, I find that one of our biggest struggles has been maintaining a constant work ethic. When the summer came around, or when we were preparing for mocks, we found it ok to say “bye, bye BlendZ”. When school started, however, a switch was flicked; everyone was suddenly working their butts off again, and we were making progress, fast. But then came mocks, and this story of “bye, bye” repeats itself. 

What I’ve asked myself for a long time now is: why? Why is it so easy for some of us to shut something out of our lives for a period of time, despite being well aware that its success is largely dependent on our work ethic? I’m not quite sure what the answer is, but I think it is lies somewhere in with how much you CARE. If you think about the aspects in your life that you care most about—be it your family, friends, a sport you play—you wouldn’t be willing to give those things up for anything, now would you? If you care enough about your business, than shouldn’t the same apply?  

Part of caring in my opinion is having EMPATHY. It’s about recognizing that a business is a group effort, and that group effort is prone to dependency, and thus, trust. This semester we’ve focused greatly on creating systems. As the product and development team, I’ve created systems for things as simple as keeping the yogurt organized in terms of expiration date, to having the plan for all the sales of the month. In the process, I’ve come to appreciate how systems allow me to MAXIMIZE my time and MINIMIZE the effort that I delegate to menial tasks.

But as we know, the factors that make up a business are interconnected; therefore, my systems are often dependent upon other peoples systems in order to succeed, as are other people’s dependent upon mine. That’s where empathy rolls in. I’ve come to understand the value in getting my work done because I know that without it, other people can’t do their own, and thus, I’m pushed to not simply getting my work done, but getting it done right.

On a separate note, this semester has also given me the opportunity for INTROSPECTION.

I often try to fix other peoples mistakes in an attempt to stop us from failing as a whole. I do so because I try to see the “big picture” of failing. The problem comes in that my idea of the “big picture” often only includes the people that we will have affected from failing, and the person who will be blamed for the “failure”.
 
I don’t take the time to step back and truly look at the “big picture”. I don’t recognize that at times, the stress gained from trying to fix a problem, is much larger than what would result from letting the project fail; it’s good to be a fighter, but you need to choose what battles to fight. And sometimes—as harsh as it may sound—the best way to let someone learn is by letting them fail.

If you’ve ever gone on a TECHO build, you know what it’s like to be sitting on the bus on the way back. Your arms are sore, your legs are wobbly, you’re sunburnt, hungry, and very, but very dirty. Beyond the physical exhaustion, however, you’re filled with a type of warmth that trickles through even the tiniest cracks in your body. It’s a humbling warmth; one that arises from knowing you had something to do with helping a little girl who used to share a bed with three others, or a family that had no access to a bathroom or sturdy infrastructure. 

But this feeling only lasts so long. 

We then return to our regular lives, were we find it inevitable to become BLINDED to the REALITY that surrounds us. The home itself may be a sustainable effort, but the giving from our part is usually not. It’s a matter of simply raising the money, building the home, and recycling the process.

This Saturday, I went to help out in Habla Roosevelt, BlendZ’s socially responsible initiative that Wonga, F, and Corey have developed to teach English to the kids of FDR’s workers. Here I was, surrounded by at least 35 kids all of whom were repeating the ABC in English, learning how to spell out their names, explain their family tree diagrams, and blissfully scream out different professions. You could tell how much they valued the experience.

And so did I.

In the time that I worked closely with Fiorella, Claudia, and Sary Adriana—helping them differentiate the “e”, “i”, and “a” in English—I was able to really let the experience sink in, and I was reminded of the feeling coming back from a TECHO build. 

What draws the difference between the two, however, is that with Habla Roosevelt that humbling feeling of warmth remains for long because you leave knowing that you're going to come back. And therefore, the initiative itself is sustainable (because the kids practice English for 4 hours a week) and the giving from our part is sustainable as well because we play an essential role in providing that one on one attention to the kids. 

For a long time before Habla Roosevelt, we were thinking of a project that would allow us to combine SUSTAINABILITY with IMPACT. We usually found ourselves leaning towards options that favored one more than the other. When I look at what BlendZ’s socially responsible initiative has developed into today, however, I think both sustainable and impacting; Wonga, F, and Corey are the ones to thank. They’ve managed to add value to our business that goes far beyond any monetary value, and in the process they’ve allowed us, or anyone, to take a part in doing the same. 

I rather be thought of as the world’s worst investor.

If you think about it, so much of today depends on how we choose to sell ourselves. From things as menial as what we choose to post on Facebook, to what we choose to write on our college applications, we have the ability to sell ourselves a certain way through the power of a simple click, post, sentence, a simple choice.

But does the simplicity of doing so make it right?

Warren Buffet—world’s largest investor of the twentieth century—believed that there are two types of people, those of us with an inner scorecard - we judge ourselves relative to our own goals - and those of us with an outer scorecard – we judge ourselves relative to others.  

Those of us who resemble best with the latter, are the ones who would have the tendency to post things that don’t necessarily represent who we are, but more so, who we want others to think we are.

I mention this because on Thursday of last week we watched a documentary in class called Jiro Dreams of Sushi, the story of an 85-year-old sushi guru, Jiro Ono, and the first person I associated Buffet’s quote to.

Jiros restaurant has 10 seats, serves once a day, has no bathroom inside, and is located in the basement of an office building off a subway station. The Michelin Guide, however, awarded his restaurant three stars, which off their criteria means: "Une des meilleures tables, vaut le voyage", exceptional cuisine, worth a special trip. Reservations must be made a month ahead of time.

As his restaurant grew more popular along Japan, more popular amongst the world, Jiro could have easily rethought its location, opened up more than once a day, and in general, made the necessary changes to have his restaurant resemble our built-in conception of a great restaurant. But he didn’t. And I think that’s largely because he lives through an inner scorecard.

Jiros goal was never to be a Michelin Guide recipient, it was to perfect sushi and to do the best he can at what he does; the awards, the fame, the recognition, are simply by-products of his success in doing so.

For the past month and a half, I’ve been studying for mocks. It’s been several weekends of saying no to the beach, and also, several weekends of several people confused as to why I care so much. To them, I’ve already been accepted to college, so this test doesn’t really matter in the big scheme of things. And although I sometimes wish I could care a little less—it would save me a whole lot of stress—I admit that I care a whole lot. The why to that remains unknown, even to me. 

But something I can say, or better said, something this documentary made me think about, is that regardless of the tests results, I should be content with knowing that I busted my a*** off studying and that I really do know and understand the content. 

At the end, that’s what a test should really be about, and if the score doesn’t reflect that, that’s where the certain sense of value and purpose of having an inner scorecard comes in. It let’s you see past the grade, past what other people may think of the grade, and allows you to humbly settle with the feeling of having given your best. 

My mind immediately started rummaging through all the possible reasons... Was it my ACT? Probably, given that my score was far below the 32 average achieved by most who attend Wash U. But wait. Hold on. Could it have also been the fact that I asked for financial aid?

This thought process went on for almost an hour; I kept going back and forth on what it could have been, what I did wrong, and yup... that same feeling of worthless remained. But between then and today, I realized that the reason doesn't really matter to me anymore. I'm ok with the rejection now. 

As much as we say that college shouldn't be about prestige, there is something about prestige that’s dangerous enough to whirl you in. As soon as we hear that someone's been accepted to Stanford, Yale, Harvard—any school with a “big name”—we immediately create a profile for that person of "oh they’re smart and they’re bound to be successful". Now there's no doubt that the people getting accepted into such universities are amongst the brightest, but does that mean that they're secured a life time of achievement? Not necessarily, they're two sets of points, and I was failing to make the distinction.  

In his article, Frank Bruni tells the story of Peter, who attended Indiana University, and that of his friend (who's name remains unknown), and attended Yale. Based on the rankings, you would’ve never stopped to think that Peter and his friend both ended up working in the same place, now would you? They did. After graduating, they were both new hires at the Boston Consulting Groups.

The story of Peter and his friend is no anomaly, however; Mr. Bruni makes that clear, and I'd have to agree. The people being accepted to universities like Yale and Stanford are maybe two students in a grade of 100. But the number of people who end up being successful... that goes far beyond a fraction of two. 

My point being that factors such as "intelligence" - that which gets you top marks on tests like the SAT/ACT - and the prestige of the college you attend, have somewhat of an influence on what you can achieve, but it can only do so much. College doesn't define us; instead, it's what we choose to do in college that will paint the picture of who we are and who we'll become. The power I see in that is that our choice for how we choose to paint the picture, and what we choose to paint, is limitless. 

My Wash U application may have made no distinction when placed next to the application of thousands of others, but once again, I’m ok with that now. Because the knowledge that I've gained from all of my experiences these past few years define me far more than a rejection letter, and I see college as an opportunity to grow like-wise experiences, regardless of where I end up.  

When I first joined the IA, the one factor I was afraid of, given that this was a pilot program, was whether or not I would be accepted into a good university. The error in my thought was that my definition of a good university then, was a university of prestige - because I expected something in return from simply attending. My definition of a good university today, however, is that which will allow me to paint my picture - because I realize that the return from attending is completely dependent on what I choose to make of attending. 

After getting rejected from Wash U, someone told me something that I think is worth sharing; it sums up this entry in a sentence:

Change happens quickly. From one day to the next, one second to the next, one single driving thought to the next, change happens quickly. Think about it. 

For those of us who are planning to study abroad, we’ll go from living in our conventional lives one day, to living in the unknown the next. In the time frame of a plane ride, we run into a new country and culture, where the only thing we can expect to be the “same” is our body and mind. 

On Thursday, as I went to check on the progress of the BlendZ cart with Drew, we witnessed change occur. Despite having put a lot of thought into the initial design for the cart, we failed to think of some of the most crucial aspects to the carts success... Would the dimensions of the cart allow it to pass through a door? Did we have a designated place to throw away the trash? Where was the water sewage going to drain out? Where were we going to plug in the blenders?

Or a few you could say... Some people, in a situation like this, would have chosen to simply stick to their original design, and deal with the mistakes made when the mistakes became a problem. It’s easy to settle with the thought of  “I tried”, “I put a lot of time into something”, and whoops, “I failed”. Why? Because we can find the comfort in saying that we’ve learned from this failure. 

But in the case of a project like this, we’re investing a lot of money into the cart, and thus, failure comes at an expensive price. For me, this situation is more of a matter of learning through the process, making the necessary changes as they come about, and then, if we still fail, finding comfort in saying that we learned through failure. 

Most people who know me, know that I’m a perfectionist. I’ll work on something until I feel no more work can be done to it. This is something Drew and I did with the cart’s design. The problem is that we built the design to such “perfection”, that when we handed it to Fernando (the cart manufacturer), we didn’t stop to question a single aspect of it.

For instance, we wanted the cart’s fruit compartment to be made of a special material that would keep the fruit cold. Fernando told us he could do this, and explained that the compartments would be made out of Styrofoam. 

Did we question how long these compartments would last? 

No. And we learned our lesson (it turns out that the Styrofoam is effective in keeping the fruit cold, but it forms mold quickly).  

The point being that we need to question perfection. We have to think about all the possible ways something can fail, and have a solution to them, before making decisions. Drew and I should have asked Fernando how long this material would last us, or if he’d even recommended that we use it. 

We went to visit the cart with the idea that we would simply have to explain to Fernando the details we wanted him to include in it, and we left with the task of having to rethink the entire interior design. Talk about change. 

It happens quickly doesn’t it?