More Than Just A Military Base

My topic kind of goes off of what Donnie said comparing private schools to public schools. However, I have attended three different varieties of schools; military base schools (no, I did not go there because I was a bad child), private school, and public school. Although my military base school was not completely considered private in the regards that my parents had to pay for it, it was also not open to all public personnel’s to attend. My biggest struggle in my life has been trying to handle the emotional aspects of being a “military brat.” So often it goes unnoticed what goes on in military families because from the outside looking in, you are happy that you can say someone in your family is fighting for this country. However, you take on more of an emotional toll than you had ever asked for or anticipated while growing up and that was a huge encounter that I faced when going to the military base school. Not only were the teachers focused on the quality or your work over quantity, but also they were also emotionally invested in your feelings towards being in a military family and taking on more responsibility than you should have been at that particular age. I started attending the military base school when I went into second grade and attended it till my seventh grade year before we moved. Those five years that I attended school were the most memorable years because as cliché as this may sound, the teachers were there for me through those 6 months that I didn’t have my father while he was deployed. I had friends there who knew exactly how I felt. Yet, when I would attend private school and public school, I never had that emotional connection with people while my father was gone. I never had the understanding people who knew how it felt to have cards sent through the mail for your birthday, rather than having your father there next to you. Everyday I attended the military base school, I walked out with more knowledge with regards to literature, reading, math, and history but I also walked out with more knowledge on how to cope with everything in my day-to-day life, which I still use to this day. I was able to set aside in the indifferences in my life and focus on my education because I had such a respectable school to attend everyday.