My Brother, My Inspiration

All of my life, I have been the model student. I have remained competitive, studied rigorously and have gained the attention and respect of my teachers and peers. I was always the recipient of numerous awards and other such forms of recognition and was always making my parents "proud of me." I strived to be the best not only in comparison to my fellow classmates, but as the oldest of six children, to my own brothers and sisters. They all fared pretty well, but my one brother had more difficulty than the others. Michael was the second youngest and he was an exceptionally bright boy, however his work in school was shoddy and clearly not reflective of his enormous potential. In kindergarten, when all of the other children had only half-days, Michael would have a full-day of special class. He would attend lunch with my friends and I, who would save him some snacks or buy him some ice cream-he became all of our little brother. The long day at such a young age was understandably exhausting for him, and on the way home from school, he would fall asleep on my shoulder. As the oldest child, I had always felt this added responsibility to be the "second mother," but with Michael this became especially so the case. As the years progressed, and also our age, this attachment grew more and more. By the time I was in middle school, I was there right alongside my mother at his parent-teacher conferences, speaking up to the teacher on his behalf. I saw education from a whole other perspective. I was the honor student, Michael the special education student. My teachers believed in me, while his felt a G.E.D. was all they saw in his future at the age of 10. I was dismayed at how emotionless they were to our cries for more support and more faith in all that he could be. He was in 4th grade at one point, learning at the 1st grade level. I could not see how he would ever catch up, and I knew he could if only given the chance. It hurt me so much to see how differently he was treated and I began to see comparisons of such disparities in treatment with my own classmates over the years. It had always appeared to me that those in the honors track, and those in the special ed one were treated quite differently, perhaps most simply and yet most importantly in the faith that the teachers had in their students. My parents eventually took my brother out of the public school that he was attending to that of a parochial school and his improvement was utterly amazing. Today Michael is at his age's level in school and is an average to high average student, who also balances extracurricular activities. This I attribute to the fortunate team of teachers that he had, who saw in him what we had all seen as a family in him for years. Today, Michael is the hardest worker that I have ever seen and he absolutely touches my heart as to the drive of the human spirit. It is because of him that I have always had an interest in education and in making conditions better for our children. He is in a sense my inspiration in life, and I love him dearly.

Charlene Reynolds
Foundations of Education
American University