Our Brookline community has strong presumptions regarding what individual success means and how it can be achieved. The pressures to ‘succeed’ can hinder our abilities to pursue our passions outside of the classroom, which can construct a misguided notion of what ‘success’ means.

In recent years, students have felt increased pressure to build their resumes and to choose activities and classes through the eyes of college admissions officers. At an age where exploration and maturation are key to personal and educational growth, students are often compelled to follow societal norms which funnel them into a system that seems to prioritize economic over personal growth.

The practice of taking a year off between high school and college, or a gap year, enables students to break this cycle. After twelve long years of a traditional educational experience, students can feel disenchanted with formal education. A gap year can give students an opportunity for a different and more personal learning experience.

I chose to defer my college admission for a year and take a gap year because I felt that in order for me to stay focused and make the most of my education, I first needed to step back from institutionalized academic education and pursue different activities and passions.

Next year, I will be participating in City Year in Washington D.C. City Year is an organization where volunteers between the ages of 18 and 24 work with the students, staff and families of inner-city schools in over 20 cities nationally to support children and help them stay in school.

I hope my experiences during my gap year will help me discover passions and interests that I did not have a chance to pursue in high school. I hope this will help guide me towards specific areas of interest once I attend college.

City Year’s active fight to end educational inequality will grant me the opportunity to work in an individualized manner with children in low-income communities. Furthermore, I hope that living independently away from home in an intense yet supportive working environment will prepare me for adulthood before I go off to college.

City Year’s long teaching days and community-based work seem to be the right fit for me. However, the multitude of gap year programs can give all high school graduates an opportunity for exploration. Ultimately, the goal of a gap year is to learn about oneself and one’s interests in a non academic environment, and then to translate these findings, and the increased maturity accumulated, into a richer college experience.

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