Haldar 1

Ankana Haldar
Michael Schueth
ENG 1301-WS2
26 Mar 2014
My Success Champion Rough Draft
This is not the first time I am portraying my grandfather as the most influential person in
my life, but whenever I get a chance to write an essay about my success champion, I love to
express my feeling towards the old but very juvenile person, my grandfather. In my childhood
days, it was amazing to listen to all his real life stories, even though, I admit that it was hard for
me to understand everything. Somehow his voice, and his way of speaking mesmerized me and I
tried to follow him blindly. When I grew up and started understanding the objective of my life, I
could realized how those incidents and stories were so inspiring for a little girl, as they gradually
helped to build her mind to take right decision in future. Later on after my grandfathers dead, I
was more interested to gather information about him from my father and other relatives. My
respect towards him was eventually raised, as I got to know how he tried to establish a different
way of education system in West Bengal and tried to help poor villagers children by introducing
various practical based education processes at free of cost. In this highly competitive world
where most people believe that higher education is the traditional gateway to achieve success,
and a necessary step for betterment in life, for my grandfather those was being as optional or
even unimportant, as he did not believe that traditional academic intelligence is everything. He
believed that life would only be meaningful if someone could enjoy what he or she is doing and
he emphasized to start an education system where people could enjoy studying followed by
several experimentations.
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My grandfather spent his early childhood in a boarding school, where children would not
be allowed the freedom to let their creative minds beyond school walls and dull text books. He
considered his own education as ineffective. Twenty years later, he established an institution for
little kids that he visualized to be a place where education is not strictly bound to conventional
learning method, but the place to share ideas of different cultures of India. A few years after, his
school became popular to establish a new way of learning where the village children could learn
the skills needed to become self- sufficient. Belonging to a conventional family background, it
was hard for my grandfather to go against his parents, but he could not accept to see himself in a
position tagged by rich and established person. He struggled a lot to break the rules and
ultimately he could follow his dream by establishing school with his little savings and funds
from some rich people in the village. His struggle, dedication and unmaterialistic idealism
always make me amazed and delightful.
I still remember those sunny afternoons, when I plucked the petals of the flowers from
my mothers garden and could suddenly hear his voice saying that Please dont waste your time
to pluck the petals, because by doing this you never touch the beauty of flower. I loved him and
did not want to let him down, so I stopped playing with flowers. Later I realized how he actually
helped me to visualize the beauty of natural things. Similarly, I tried a lot to memorize my books
without analyzing the subject and could not do well in class exams. I used to complain to my
parents and my grandfather saying that, Today I did excellent but again my teacher gave me
poor grade. Why does not she love me? My parents got angry but grandfather smiled and
accompanied me the whole day to understand my loopholes. He explained the subject by
exhibiting a unique way. I could remember how he used some objects inside the room to explain
Newtons Law. He used to tell my parents that Let her live her life like a dream, one day those
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dreams will help her to make the real story of life. How simple way he could relate the
complete meaning of life. I learned paintings and singing from him, and painting is now my
passion and it gives me some stress free moments in my busy schedule. He believed in the
creativity and learning ability of individual, that all people have different way of learning style
and uniqueness that should be explored and appreciated by sharing their ideas for others well-
being. I got my inspiration from his words like Always keep your dream alive and let it grow.
And I always follow his words and now I am planning to exhibit my paintings and hoping to
accomplish my dream. My grandfather did not believe in punishment and in his own school, he
replaced corporal punishment with self-discipline. He applied his own way of learning and tried
to establish a good example of contemporary education method. Unfortunately, he could not
keep his school alive due to lack of economic support and political pressure. Although, it is hard
to find any historical evidence of his work, but his efforts to change the traditional way of
learning has a deep impact in my life to see the things in a different way. His idealism always
assisted me for being a good human being, maybe I am not a rich person, but always try to give
value and respect to others thought. My sensitive thoughts and responsibilities which I think are
inherited from my grandfather will help me to focus on health care profession.
My parents tried to reinforce me to take Engineering course in my higher education,
though I took Zoology due to my inclination towards Biology. I always remember my
grandfathers words, The higher education is the path to make our life more exploring and
interesting. I tried to follow him and also my own interest, and in turn I successfully completed
my education and got a chance to share my knowledge as a lecturer in Biology. I enjoyed my
profession as I could relate myself to my grandfather when I used to see those inspiring faces in
my students in the class room. Life moved on and I got a chance to come USA and now again
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my zeal inspired me to choose a new profession in health care, where I will get pleasure to serve
people. My grandfather believed that education should be based on qualities like self-discipline,
tolerance, enthusiasm, good manners, and inner freedom. I always try to follow his idealism in
my life and this would help me to achieve my dream in future.
Somehow, my story resemblances with Gerald Graffs thought, where he argues by
saying, On the other hand, inviting students to write about cars, sports,.......through academic
eyes, that is, to think and write ....in the wider culture., and "Give me the student anytime who
writes sharply argued, sociologically acute analysis of an issue in Source over the students who
writes a lifeless explication of Hamlet." In these statements he says that most of the teachers are
interested in conventional learning methods, rather taking full advantages of some students
potential to think in a different way. Intellectualism can be present even in street smarts, and it
does not mean being street smarts students, they are not able to be successful students in school.
He believes, that besides the conventional academic intellectualism, there are some kind of
hidden intellectualisms that may not expose through the established scholarly ways, but hide
themselves under the mask of ordinary forms. This hidden intellectualism may be ignored due to
his ordinary talk related with sports, fashion, pop-stars, etc. The truth is that arguing about such
non-academic, ordinary topics require as much intellectual ability as debates about theoretical
issues do, and every street-smart student has as equal potential to take part of these kinds of
arguments when compared to an academically skilled student. To some extent, I could find the
similarity in Graffs and my grandfathers thought, as according to them, communication is key
to understanding peoples intelligence. Without communication, nobody would know how to get
success not only in career, but also in personal life. Sharing ideas and exploring new things are
most important to become an expert in any specific matter.
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The completion of this essay would not have been possible without referring again my
grandfathers idealism towards education system and his devotion towards his work. Surprisingly
I got similarity of my grandfathers story with the article Gerald Graff. My understanding by
analyzing the fact that childrens minds are sensitive to the influences of the world so we should
use their subconscious minds which are active and always imbibing some lesson, and realizing
the joy of knowing. It would be appreciable if people could change their stereotypic mind not to
undermine their kids area of interest to further education. Though, it is true that unless having a
traditional and specialized degree, in todays world it is hard to face success, freedom in
education is also important as it gives the opportunity to explore someones own interest. My
grandfather helped me to realize that life could be more meaningful if we can find the key to
unlock the doors of opportunity.