[font="times new roman"] It is hard to be in school on time while working in a family restaurant as a student. Every day I will have to go to bed at late night. It is hard to maintain a good grade while not having enough sleep. As time goes by, family influences me by not attending to school. I almost drop out of high school in sophomore year. I start to recognize that I need to educate myself more, instead of working in the restaurant for my family. Finally I return to the school, but is really a tough time of making up all the missing work and to obtain my credit from my teacher.[/font]
[font="times new roman"] Going to bed late at night have become my daily life style. There are no surprises whether I am sleepy in school or not for myself, but my teacher start to recognize my action in school and start talking to me about the situation. They told me I have to go to bed earlier, and I answer back that I will. Meanwhile I know I wouldn’t be able to make it, I just don’t want to disappoint my teacher. As I attend to class and sleeping in a classroom become my frequently action, instead of doing class work. My teacher see me so often sleeping in the classroom and is taking seriously asking me what was going on, and I told them about my situation at home, that I have to work till late night and didn’t get enough sleep. Therefore, my teacher start concerning about talking to my parent. Right after that I am out of school for three month.[/font]
[font="times new roman"] While I’m out of school for three month, I work in my family restaurant every day. On the first day of not attending to school, which I’m suppose to, I feel much more better because I got more sleep. Going to bed late now is not a problem any more, because I could just simply wake up at 10 or 10:30 in the morning, that’s the time my work schedule are. With all that much time, I got at least like 9 hour of sleep, which now I got no more problem of been sleepy. As time pass, I start to feel that I should go back to school because every day all the place I could go to is my family restaurant, and my home. I wouldn’t be able to do anything else besides working. I feel my daily life to be boring, just like I’m in a jail with no freedom. Finally I start to talk to my parent about going back to school.[/font]
[font="times new roman"] It is hard to talk to my parent returning back to school, because they get use to see me working in the restaurant, but I feel education is more important than working, so I talk to them about it. When I talk to my parent about what I think, they certainly are not happy about it because they feel family restaurant must have family member to work together instead of outsider working in the restaurant. As a result of talking to my parent, they finally agree I should return to school and go to class. Working for three month certainly helps my parent earn much more money, but I miss lot of my school work. [/font]
[font="times new roman"] When I return back to school, all of my teacher and my classmate telling me that I miss lot of work and I have ton to make it up. In the beginning, it was really tough to make up all the work that I miss because there are some class work that I need someone to explain to me, but no one is available to, so I could only do it all by myself. Therefore, every day I will have to read the text book for 1 to 2 hour to understand the entire concept. Finally my hard work help to catch up with the class and start to follow what the teacher is currently teaching, and I pass my entire regent. I was so happy I pass my regent test at last. [/font]
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Name: Guang Zhou Lin
Age: 19
School: HPHS, New York