Byron Parilla
Jimmie Wilson
EWRIT 211
October 6th 2014
The Obstacles There are plenty of different goals and aspirations that I have set for myself, but the ultimate goal is for me to become a better student and transfer out of De Anza to a UC of my choice. Before I transfer to a UC I am going to need to work on my bad habits that I’ve created throughout my previous school years. Getting rid of my bad habits is only one of the few obstacles I have in my way of becoming a good student. The other problems consist of my lack of motivation, bad time management, and also my lack of discipline in school. Although I try to be a good student I am plagued by my constant distractions, bad habits, and lack of motivation. So in order for me to reach my ultimate goal of transferring to a UC, I am going to need to clean up my act and really put in the hard work to achieve the grades necessary to accomplish my goal. Through middle school and high school I failed to take school seriously and I vowed to myself that I would take college more seriously and prove to myself that the sky’s the limit. The things that distract me from focusing on school range from my own hobbies to chores that I have to take care of on my own time. My own hobbies consist of making music, skateboarding, and going out with friends. Of course I should learn to prioritize my time but sometimes when you’re a kid you make the bad decisions without realizing the consequences. My personal decisions to focus on other things during school usually affects me negatively because I end up falling behind in school and when I fall behind in school I tend to become discouraged with catching up on my work. So I just continue to push it to the side and not address the fact that I am falling behind in my classes. My bad time management tends to leave my priorities scrambled and I don’t know what to start get working on first. So as my school work starts to pile, as do my chores, and this leaves me with a little amount of time to accomplish a lot of work. I have to work on my time management and I need to learn how to plan out my schedule so that I can be on an actual timed schedule. Or I can write everything in my college planner, either way I am going to have to learn how to manage time effectively and finish everything on time. If I fail to manage my time in college I’m only going to be wasting my own time and money on classes. If I can ditch these bad habits then I am going to be able to stay on top of my classes and all my school work which will lead to me being caught up in my classes so I can pass with a high grade. These bad habits I have were developed in middle school and high school because during those times I failed to take school seriously and I was a mediocre student. These bad habits were with me so long they became a part of my lifestyle so now they are hard to get rid of. A lot of my habits relate to me being lazy and not taking care of what’s mandatory in my life. When I say bad habits I am referring to my study habits, not paying attention in class, and in general not having healthy school habits overall. My habits lead me to fail classes because I have trouble paying attention and I get lost in my classes and fall behind. These habits become hard to abandon because I’ve had them for so long. At times in high school I got to the point where I wasn’t even attending class for days at a time and I got caught up in the whole “truant” student situation. Not being in class had a lot to do with my bad grades because I never knew the class material and was always left to guess on tests or quizzes. Skipping class and not studying stem directly from my lack of motivation to do good in school. My goals in high school were really different from my current goals. Back then I didn’t care about school or being a good student but they have changed since then and I now have different priorities. The problems I have with my motivation are that I plainly did not desire to be