Life is full of surprises!

(Um texto escrito para um uni adviser)

Musa Khalidi,

I am Marcos Ramos Junior, Oto Alves' friend. He let me know that you would like me to write about some things to add to my application.

It's very difficult to define with few words the whole meaning behind the UWC experience, but the first word that comes to mind is awesome. It was something that I can point out in my life and say for sure “it has changed my life”. The experience is very powerful in different ways. And if you ask “so was it just pleasure?”. The answer is no, that is one of the reasons why the experience is powerful. As we joke in UWC WK ,life on the hill is painful. Therefore I understand that the magical thing about UWCs is the whole combination of things: a boarding school, IB, community service, people from all around the
world and a general desire of building a better world.

Talking about academics I have never suffered so much with my studies.“Yes IB will kill you” (we had a t-shirt with this “slogan”). From being a “top 10 student” in my old Brazilian school I went to being a
dumb student. The first thing to blame is ENGLISH, the “evil” language that I didn't speak before going to UWC WK. Musa I was aware that it would be hard but when you live the situation
you see that the theory can be very different from the practice. I couldn't follow the classes, I couldn't answer questions, and the list keeps increasing. For sure this was one of the greatest challenges for
me and it affected my academics greatly (answering to quality,answering to time etc).The hardest subjects were Biology and Geography in general because of the vocabulary. Every new chapter was like a whole new vocabulary for me. Also I found IB itself very challenging without counting the English issue. But the lab reports, field works, portfolios were like a new world for me. My first class in a laboratory was at WK as well as my first field work.
As you can see it wasn't very easy to deal with IB, in a general view I was always in need of extra time because the usual time set for the task usually wasn't enough for me. But as time was passing by things
in general were often getting better.
My favourite subjects were History (especially African History) and ironically English. In my opinion the areas where I made the most of it, were where we had outstanding teachers and I learned a lot. The extended essay is something that I loved to do. I did it on Politics, about the World Social Forum, my supervisor was Patricia Earnshaw (History teacher). It is something that I am really proud of, I put in a lot of effort and to see our own work becoming alive and done is pretty rewarding. It is that feeling when you take a look at the sheets all together and think to yourself “ I did that”. Without mentioning that was a topic that I like a lot, to some extent I am kind of involved with the World Social Forum and I had the opportunity to be there. It was my favourite field work, I think I grew a lot in political terms after the WSF. The only risky thing was that I wasn't doing Politics as a subject, so my coordinator was a little concerned about whether I could focus on Politics properly.

Another very strong part of my UWC experience was the community service. As you may know Swaziland is a very needy (this is an awful word but it is true) country. I wrote my college personal essay based on the HIV/AIDs Education community service. You can see through the essay that it was very important to me socially,politically and personally. It’s something that I carry with my life and when I take some decisions my mind goes back to what I have seen and learned
there, so it is pretty important for me.

Last but not least people at UWC are just too much fun. Those niggers (it is an inside joke and there is not a pejorative for us) are just wonderful. So many stories that I carry with me, the interaction with people shows us so many things. They are also responsible for what I am and what I'll become, the ups and downs, fights, love stories, crazy people are all part of being a UWC student, and it is a
cliché but I got to mention it, there is no price for that this is for life and there is no price for life.

Now moving to my current life. Before being an English teacher I was working as a bouncer in private parties I didn't really like it. It is very tiring, low paid, and I had to work especially on weekends. But
it was some experience for sure. Working as an English teacher is quite fun. I chose to do this because I would be able to keep in touch with English, I have as one of my goals to be a teacher and I believe
that even in teaching language you are able to spread information. Teachers are very important people in my life so I think I identify myself as a teacher. Dealing with students is not very simple, there
are many personalities out there so as a teacher I have to be very sensible and sensitive. Students can surprise you in positive and negative ways. Up to now I have been quite lucky, I think I am doing a
decent job and have had in general some positive feedback from my coordinator.

IB grades:

HL - History 5, English 5, Geography 4.
SL – Biology 4,Mathematics 3, Portuguese ST 4.
TOK – C
Extend Essay – B

Total: 26 points.

Diploma Awarded.

I think my final grade was lower than my predicted. I guess my predicted was around 30 (at WK we don't know our predicteds) and I was aiming for 35, I was quite sure I would get 32,33. I was very disappointed with the grades and quite surprised. The most I studied for was Mathematics. But I will go straight to the point, Oto has advised me to tell you this although I am still not sure about it but I will share with you anyway. My grandmother died exactly on the first day of my IB exams. It was the 5th of November and I had paper one for Mathematics. I didn't share this with anyone at WK, just with some close friends. I didn't want people to say things like “oh man in your exam week”. Oto told me that you would like to know this. I don't know if my grandmother's death could have affected my performance. But also it wasn't easy Musa, my grandma was like my mother, she raised me and I always lived with her. I am very cool about those things but I have to say that I didn't want to be sitting
exams anymore, I would have liked to go home and stay with my family. The feeling of not saying goodbye to a beloved person is awful and I had never felt that before. But life is full of surprises and it
happened and I could not do anything about it. I am telling you this because I am following Oto's advice, he is a close friend of mine. I haven't mentioned this to my counselor Jonh Storer and didn't mention it to any other colleges.

Finally talking about why Earlham and what possible major. I got to know Earlham because of Oto. So I went and kind of did a lot of research about colleges. My main source was the site, I went through
many things on the site, especially videos. The statements about Earlham made by ex UWC students are very touching I would say. So when I saw it (Earlham's Davis Scholars) I thought “I am also looking for this kind of experience”. One thing that may sound a little silly but is true is that when I saw that the admissions office requires a photo I thought “these guys are very serious about not treating us like numbers” and I found this very positive, this “ got” me. Another thing was the size of the college, my first experience with small classes was at WK, before I used to have around 40 students in
the same class. At WK my largest class had 16 students and I found this important in my college choices. I guess what was my best and more personalized source was Oto. I was asking him many questions throughout his first year at Earlham. So the story that the best advertising is “word-of-mouth” might be true. Talking about majors, I have on my mind Politics, International Relations (I don't really see these as separate things) History, Latin/Africa Studies and some curiosity in Psycology. I am very keen on Politics and its connections. I am also involved with social movements so I think this is what I will be doing, this or something close to this.


I hope I have answered all your questions. Oto also told that you may want to speak with me on skype or the phone.For me it would more than fine.
Thanks for the attention.


Cheers.


Marcos Jr


PS: I am copying Oto on this e-mail.