At first, perfection actually sounds like a good thing. Everyone has looked at that one kid in class who just gets everything right and thought, "Yeah, I wish I were like that." I've thought that too. So you try to get there. You stay up late, you study more than you usually would, and for a moment it feels like you're doing everything right. But the next day, right before the test or even during it, that confidence just disappears. Instead of thinking about what you know, you start wondering what you don't know. Did I miss something? Should I have studied more? And that's when it starts to feel off. The goal was to do well, but somehow it turned into needing to be perfect—and now even being prepared doesn't feel like enough. * And that feeling doesn't just stay in school. It shows up in the smallest things. Even something that's supposed to be relaxing—like cooking—can turn stressful the moment you expect it to be perfect. You spend time trying to...
Click Play Theme to set the mood 🎧 While reading the ICE #1 prompt, I couldn't help but wonder who Benjamin Banneker really was. My wonder was driven by the thought that I had never heard his name, which was unusual, as he must have been famous enough to be a topic of an AP Language essay prompt and to have written a letter to Thomas Jefferson. I decided to do some research to uncover his extraordinary accomplishments, as I was curious after reading the fairly long list of his occupations mentioned in the prompt: Astronomer, SOS, mathematician, poet, etc. Banneker lived his entire life in Baltimore County, Maryland, where he farmed tobacco on a modest plot of land. Banneker constructed his famous clock when he was only 22 years old. In an age when timepieces were still somewhat rare in the American colonies, visitors came from near and far to see a working clock built by a young man of color. Famous political figures widely recogn...