ISKRIBOL (Mga Suka ng Isang Bored na Otistik)

Suka #114

We shouldn't be giving out medals to kids who excel in school. That's coming from me who received hundreds of medals because I excelled in school. We get it. That kid's going places. Sure, he's brilliant. He's the cream of the crop; the above-average human, the elite, the first class. Putting him on the pedestal because he's too good to be on the ground isn't just right. Parents can be proud of him, of course. They have all the right to be proud. The school has the right to be proud. His teachers have the right to be proud. What else can we do to praise him even more? Put on a festival in his name? Sacrifice eighteen-year olds for His Excellency? I have been on the pedestal and the only thing it did to me was isolation. People created a line between me and the others. You see? The "others." It isn't really right because school should, above all, be the common ground. Kids all have the potential. Believe me, they all do. But we are so fixated to the idea of success that seeing someone who excels above others automatically makes him our representation of success. Everything needs a mascot now.

But that isn't really the problem. What's nagging me all this time was the question I kept asking myself: what could have happened if I didn't receive these medals? This recognition? This superficial state of being on the pedestal?

You see, isolating these kids instills the idea that the ones on the ground will always be on the ground for the rest of their lives and the ones on stage will always be on stage. The school does this ceremony every fucking year. It's always the same; the others on their chairs while the excellent kids go up on stage with their medals. Six years in elementary, four years in high school and college, the same shit. What do you think goes inside the minds of those kids who, for God knows what reason, don't excel as other kids do? "I'm so happy for you, guys, keep it up, I'm proud of y'all"? Na-fucking-da. Did it ever occur to us that maybe, maybe, these kids will think that life has already decided their place on earth because at that young age, schools already discriminate them? We have skewed the very fundamental purpose of schools: to bring about potential.

We are providing unnecessary head start to these over-achieving kids. "Hey, your grades are so good, so here's an advantage for you to live a comfortable, smooth life after school." We provide them with labels that ensure their careers. Hey, are grades not enough to satisfy them? We have already classified them with these numbers so what else can we do to worship them even more?

What could have happened to the people I know if I didn't get those medals? Maybe they wouldn't be forced to settle down, you know. They wouldn't think that this is the best that life has to offer for them. They could have been more. They could have been happier. They could have been more fulfilled. I know this because I see them every day, those people I saw on chairs while I'm on stage receiving my medals. It's fucking sad.

"Hey, maybe you're just speaking wrongly in behalf of them."

Nope. I wrote this after I came in touch with an old friend. He's a family man, now. You know what he said to me?

"It was always you, man. Since elementary, it was always you. I thought I couldn't be you even if I tried my hardest. It went on to college, you know. College was hard. So much harder for me. I was always the slow one."

Fucking medals.