Finding a scholarship for yourself

It has never been easy for a teenager to find the destination in every phase of life. When I was about to be in senior year when my friends all have their plans and orientations done I found out that my Vietnamese writings were even worse than my English ones, I was totally disoriented. I study at the best secondary school in my city, my grades were pretty good and I was considered good, but I had never thought about what I want if not compliments on good grades or what am I truly proud of- without any validation. Being a senior student, I was so overwhelmed by the disorientation. Adults expect us to get in high school for the gifted. They usually say that the moment our entrance exam results were not good enough to get into these schools for the gifted, we fail. I tried to keep following all these standards just like I have always done before, but I felt like it was enough for me and that I should start orientation by thinking about what I want, instead of what others want me to. When I was four, everything I could imagine about my secondary school life was that I would study in a beautiful school which is near my house, so that I could ride my pretty bike to school every day. The best school to me was the nearest and most beautiful one. But one day, my uncle told me about a school for the gifted and told me that I should try to get in that school because it is a good school. Since I luckily passed the exam, I have felt that there is such a gap in the way people judge students via their schools. We have been seen as elite students, and sometimes even overrated, while some others, even though they are really good, they are not validated just because they come from low-quality schools. We also receive so many great exclusive opportunities. We have the chance to study with the best teachers, our private study materials are full of advanced practice, information about scholarships programs are delivered sooner and some are even designed just for us. But sometimes I wonder why some other excellent students can not receive these opportunities just because they live so far and they study in low-quality schools. Isn't it going to be great if one day, any judgment on children through their schools fading away, and being replaced by the achievements which they are proud of? I thought about an absolute equal education, about an education where students all receive an equal quality of education, equal opportunities no matter their rationality, gender, geological location, ability, and their own strengths, literally everything, but there was nothing I could do with it, and there was no way for me to experience education like that. So I thought about going abroad, about applying to private schools, about everything that could help me escape from a stressful test preparation year and being judged if I failed. I decided to apply for the position on the board of directors of a project that I was working on, at first was just for a good-look profile. But having spent two months on probation, I realized that I even love the project much more than I thought. On our first meeting, I had to present in front of ten people, who are all much better than me in different fields. It sounds simple but I have never done it before. I was extremely worried, and maybe I did not do as well as expected, but I have crossed my line and do what I had wanted but had never done before. These two months of probation were also when many of my first times happened. For the first time, I spent time working on what I truly enjoyed. For the first time, I thought about my achievement when my ideas were successful and I was happy, was smiling the whole week even though most of my friends and adults around me thought that it is unnecessary and not meaningful at all. For the first time, I was unexpectedly calm when I received a low score on a test of my least favorite subject, even though I cried for it in the whole afternoon. I lead a team for the first time, which was my biggest fear, I could talk about all of my ideas, no matter how unrealistic it was, and after all, I had a sense of purpose and wanted to find my own destinations for my future. I started to look for an environment where I can spend more time on discovering myself, instead of running after standardized tests and academic validation, an environment where I can experience living on my own in the different cultural backgrounds to find and learn new things, and an environment where there is no difference whether I can see all the values that I love to see. Luckily I found this program thanks to my teacher. I have loved to be in Finland, and this is a great chance to pursue something that I am passionate about, to continue my enthusiasm after a long time, and to learn and improve myself in the way that I want to, rather than the safe and typical path for a senior student in middle school so that I will not regret in the future. Moreover, through some webinars hosted by Finest Future, I found out that psychology is available in Finnish high schools, and that is also what I want to study in University, so I believe that studying it in high school can build a foundation of knowledge for me to apply them when I go to university and therefore can help me prepare better. Thus, I want to receive this scholarship and study in Finland, because it will be an ideal destination in my growing-up journey.