Friday, July 25, 2008

Thank You

First I would like to respond to Mr. Gosney about the self-defence lesson. We were taught to not use these, should I say new skills to hurt anyone at anytime. The only exception is like you said, when it is really needed and when we are in a life threatening situation. So I am sorry if I caused some confusion, but we all know how to hold back! I promise!

So now I want to say that it has been FUN! We had our good-bye class session and basically everyone signed a card for one another. We all got in a circle and talked about the past 2 weeks. It was very touching I must say. It was like saying good-bye to my family because these people were my inspiration everyday. I looked up to them, learned from them, and shared my ideas with them; and they listened. I will never forget anyone! I truly hope to see them again!

The capstone project speech was not flawless, but I can say that after 3 practice runs, this one was the best! I surely felt more confident, more organized, and more self aware of what I was doing. The lessons I learned will defiantly follow me back to El Cerrito!

So a BIG THANK YOU to Mr. Ramsey, Ms. Kronenburg, Kisa, the RA's, Robin Rose, Mr. Gosney, Mr. Sanchez, and the list would probably go on and on! Thanks for helping me become more confident! Thanks for helping me have a better understanding of the world! Thanks for the support! I just feel so grateful and happy! It really feels like a dream come true. Though this chapter of my life is ending, I have a good feeling it is just the beginning back at home.

1 comment:

Don Gosney said...

Jessica⎯I hope you understand that I was being a bit facetious with my comments about your newfound self-defense skills. On the other hand, I’ve never seen a self-defense weapon created that was not eventually turned into an offensive weapon. We even like to give them names that sound so “defensive”. The word “peacemaker” has been used so often to name weapons that it’s laughable. Starting out with one of the Colt .45 handguns used in the old west to missiles we have at the ready “just in case”.

Even take a look at one of your typos where you used the word “defiantly” instead of “definitely”. Subconsciously you’ve already turned to the “Dark Side of the Force” ready to stand up to what you perceive as an injustice.

You’ve all learned so much in class, Jessica, that it’s inspiring. Through your use of these blogs, though, we can all tell how much you’ve learned from each other as well. Your interactions with people coming from diverse locales and backgrounds; your interactions with your new community; and your observations of your classmates, RA’s and instructors have all made you much more complete. This is all a very good thing for all of us back home to witness, Jessica, and it makes us very proud of what’s happened here.

We all want to see this program expand so we can expose more of our local youth to what you’ve experienced here. Those of us you left behind still have to work to prepare for future generations of ILC members. We have to raise the funds, get our sponsors to see the wisdom in donating their hard earned money to continue this program and we even have to fight some members of our community who are against everything even when it doesn’t cost them a dime.

What you’ve all accomplished back east helps us tremendously with our tasks. The blogs you all posted, Jessica, will be a tremendous asset to us as well. By the time it’s all over and done, we expect to have more than 400 pages of blog postings that we can throw down in front of our sponsors, future participants, the Ivy League schools and even those naysayers that want to kill the program saying that it’s a waste of time and resources.

Thank you, Jessica, for helping to make this year’s ILC program the great success that it is.