You be the one

Every day we live is an education, and nothing can take the place of the wisdom we gather from a lifetime of experiences. We keep our minds open to the sadness and the joy of daily life, and we learn from others the way we react when we face similar situations. This is good and necessary in building our character and preparing our soul for whatever tomorrow holds. But education in the real world encompasses so much more.

Formal education (elementary school, high school and college) gives us a base of knowledge that allows us the opportunity to add on; just as you might have a small house that you want to add rooms to in time. And the bigger that house is when we start out, the better. With little formal education, we just don’t give ourselves much to work with when it comes to building more on to it. So we must be sure that house is as big as possible to begin with.

Dropping out is never the answer. If we do not take advantage of every second of the free education our country offers us, then we are not just fooling ourselves; we are, without doubt, cheating our children and our children’s children. What we do or do not do sets a standard that generations of our family will follow. Count on it. Don’t depend on someone else down the generational line to do something good — you be the one who does it.

You be the one who is the first in your family to graduate from high school or to get a college credential. You be the one who says to all your descendants, “I did this and you can, too.”

It is not too late. Set the standard for your family and see it through, and may God bless you for doing it.

Don Reid wrote this on behalf of the Rural Horseshoe Initiative, a partnership of 14 Virginia community colleges and the Virginia Foundation for Community College Education, whose goal is to encourage rural Virginians to finish high school or earn a GED, and enroll in a community college. For more information visit vccs.edu.

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