Keng Lor
Beat the Odds
“Keng, you must become the role model for your eight younger siblings because they will follow your footsteps. Where you end up is where they will end up”. This quote from my parents motivated me to stay in school, kept my grade point average high, and attend a four-year institutional college.
I was born in a refugee camp, in Thailand, and recently migrated to the U.S in 2005. I grew up in Eastside Saint Paul, MN, a place where I transformed myself into who I am today. As the oldest child in my family, I am the role model to eight of my younger siblings. Being the first person in my family to learned English was the ultimate dilemma. I started my education in second grade, barely even know how to pronounce a single word in …show more content…
During the first week of my freshmen year, I was totally lost. I remembered stuttering a lot when I first asked the school counselor for direction to my classes. I did not know what class to take and what it even meant by general and elective courses. Most students have older siblings to back them up, but I was all alone. I had no older brother or sister to help me through high school or even to look up to. Going to high school was like walking blindfolded. I walked straight in complete darkness, and whatever the path leads me to is what I become. It was like when I first arrived in America. Everyone was a stranger other than my family. There were times when I thought of giving up because no matter where I turned to, it was a dead end. College reading and writing was something to the next level that I struggled on. I was afraid that college was going to be too difficult for me. Then one thing always make its way into my mind, my eight younger siblings. I must create a path for them to walk on, and to do that, I must continued on to work hard in school and graduate from a four-year college. I could not afford to be the quiet little boy I used to be
Beat the Odds
“Keng, you must become the role model for your eight younger siblings because they will follow your footsteps. Where you end up is where they will end up”. This quote from my parents motivated me to stay in school, kept my grade point average high, and attend a four-year institutional college.
I was born in a refugee camp, in Thailand, and recently migrated to the U.S in 2005. I grew up in Eastside Saint Paul, MN, a place where I transformed myself into who I am today. As the oldest child in my family, I am the role model to eight of my younger siblings. Being the first person in my family to learned English was the ultimate dilemma. I started my education in second grade, barely even know how to pronounce a single word in …show more content…
During the first week of my freshmen year, I was totally lost. I remembered stuttering a lot when I first asked the school counselor for direction to my classes. I did not know what class to take and what it even meant by general and elective courses. Most students have older siblings to back them up, but I was all alone. I had no older brother or sister to help me through high school or even to look up to. Going to high school was like walking blindfolded. I walked straight in complete darkness, and whatever the path leads me to is what I become. It was like when I first arrived in America. Everyone was a stranger other than my family. There were times when I thought of giving up because no matter where I turned to, it was a dead end. College reading and writing was something to the next level that I struggled on. I was afraid that college was going to be too difficult for me. Then one thing always make its way into my mind, my eight younger siblings. I must create a path for them to walk on, and to do that, I must continued on to work hard in school and graduate from a four-year college. I could not afford to be the quiet little boy I used to be