Graduated Top of My Class, Now What?

Here in the Philippines, March-April used to be the season for graduations, recognitions, moving up and other commencement exercises. Kids, teachers and parents alike are all excited to witness the culmination of a year's work by the students and teachers. A celebration, big or small, is observed to mark the fulfillment of the children's studies.

During these ceremonies, awards, honors and other accolades are given to the top performers or outstanding pupils that showed excellent performances and characteristics. Academic awards are distributed wherein the top ranking students among their peers will climb up the stage to receive medals, certificates and sometimes cash appreciation. Awards also include athletics feat and characters' acknowledgement. But what do this all mean? Did any of this have any bearing to your career, or to your job? In my case, I think, some mattered, some didn't.

Let me share all the awards I can remember so you may have a better and a clearer picture of my present state of mind.

Kindergarten

From the beginning of my school life I was put in a public school. I am very fortunate because we have a kindergarten and an elementary school near our house, it's just a 10-15 minute walk away depending on the length of your strides. But for a little boy such as myself back then, it was quite a long walk. My grandmother would take me to the center and will stay outside the classroom waiting for the classes to be done. I can still remember those long brown tables and those tiny colorful plastic chairs that we use inside the room. I was about 5 years of age then.

As expected I can't even remember a single class back then or if we even have classes then. Do kids at that age really take classes or they like just play and stuff ( I mean the average ones, excluding the geniuses) ? Anyway, from that time I experienced to be acknowledged for something in a public manner, aside from being so noisy and being overly energetic. During our graduation ceremonies, medals were distributed to all of us, since we were all good kids and I received something extra then since I was dubbed "Best in Math".

Math? Really? Wow? I am not sure if 1+1 back then was really a thing, but yeah, that's my first taste of recognition. And for a kid with occasional snot on his nose, and wanted to do nothing but play, that was an amazing feeling.

First Grade

Back in our days, public schools only offer classes from grade 1 to grade 6 only. Once you've graduated from grade 6 you can then proceed with your high school studies. When I was in grade 1, I was like six years old and studying became a little bit more of a routine. I guess we were then taught how to read and write. If my memory serves me right, during the summer after the kindergarten graduation, I took some tutorial sessions with my kindergarten teacher so when the next school year came, I was reading decently with some knowledge of the English language. I was fortunate cause I was afraid of the teacher then so I had no choice but to absorb what she was trying to teach me.

At the end of every school year during my elementary education, we will have a recognition program, like a mini graduation ceremony. There will be dance, and song numbers prepared by the unwilling students and the awardees will also climb up the stage to receive their respective awards.

For the first grade, I received an award. It was not an excellence award like the best in math I had, nor top of the class award, it was the "best in cleanliness" award, I am not sure of the wordings, it may have been "most clean". And to be perfectly honest, I do not know, up to this day, what the criteria for that award was. Maybe it was the whitest uniform I had or my little brown shorts that is always being ironed after washing. I don't know. But it was, meh.

Second Grade

Second grade was a little bit different. This is the year that I discovered the world of interschool competitions. First time I was tapped in to compete with other schools is I think about geography, history and civics ( HEKASI ). I am not sure what this subject is called right now though, last time I heard it was called MAKABAYAN. Anyhow, I was assigned to read our textbook, memorize it and know it by heart. I somehow did. Competition day came, it was just a normal class done in a different school but it was filled with quiz and questions. Anyway, I can't remember the outcome but I know that I didn't won anything.

After that interschool quiz bee, I was asked to join another competition again, this time, Mathematics. I can remember other kids from other school practicing and doing complicated math problems using their own shortcuts and all that, and there I was not even sure if I was doing my long divisions right. So still I did not won, that's obvious from the get go.

So at the end of the year, I came in 2nd place on the class. Our class was considered the first section so in short, I came in 2nd place for the whole second graders. It was amazing again. Nothing too special, I remember my reward being a meal from Jollibee, on my father's expense. Well, that in addition to a silver medal. It was a fine day because I got to play with my friends around the quadrangle of the school while the program is on going.

Third Grade

Third grade was a weird year for me. This is the year that I got to know what chalk tastes like. For some reason, I had that chalk melting in my mouth and I am white all over. This was also the year I knew that the ink of the ballpoint pen cannot be washed down easily from a white polo. Fascinating.

This was also the year that we were taught how to write fast while the teacher does the dictation. I don't know why but for some reason we needed to write on our notebooks, the texts that we can literally read on the textbooks. Weird. And for that, our "lectures" on our notebooks were graded. I sure failed those, because I myself could not understand whatever lines I drew there.

I can't be certain if I joined any other contests back then but I am sure that I did not win anything either.

A school year in a public school back then is divided by 4 periods, or quarters. Every quarter there will be a periodical exam that will test all that we learned from the past couple of months. That will account to the majority of our final grades that will be marked down on our report cards that will be claimed by our parents or guardians every end of the quarter.

I remember going back and forth from 2nd place to 3rd place at that year with some encouragement from our teacher. I believe that I ended up getting the 3rd place when the school year was done. Since I was still in the first section, it's not too shabby a place to be in. Recognition day came, same old same old. We played across the grass field while they were calling up on stage the awardees. I also came up to grab that bronze medal and a certificate. But most of all, I was excited for our treat after the program. We'll go to a fast food restaurant and eat out. Simpler times held the best memories.

Hey there!

The story time is getting too long and I am afraid that you are getting bored so I'll take a break from this one first, and I'll do some coding first. I'll get back to it as soon as I can and I hope that you join me in that next one too.

Thanks so much and as always,

Cheers!!!

Sources:

Lead image : https://www.bestcolleges.com/blog/how-to-celebrate-college-graduation-covid19/

Image 1 : https://www.istockphoto.com/search/2/image?phrase=kindergarten+graduation

Image 2 : https://stockfresh.com/image/6457088/stickman-kids-group-certificate