Often, I ask myself why I am still in New York City. I hate it here, from the bland urban view to the awful smells. I don’t know how anyone could want to live here for an extended period of time. Then I remember that I’m poor and need affordable education. So, I decided to attend CUNY. But I’m also tired of America as a whole, quite the dilemma. But that brings me to the question, why do I attend CCNY? 

The reason I am attending CCNY is because I want to eventually attend law school and this school is also a short trip from the CPUSA HQ. I want to go to law school because being a public defender is an interesting enough job that seems like it would make a good difference in the lives of working-class people and that is the business, I’m in. Though I do hate the way most of our education system is set up, I’ve been enjoying college as its only two hours of class every day and I can get home at a mostly reasonable time. I also get to learn interesting things, a great contrast to high school.  

Being a philosophy major, the diverse pallet of students provides a great pool of ideas and values to study and understand other peoples’ understanding of the world and other such things. Part of what brought me to philosophy was the political application of it and how it helps one organize the world in a way that seems more practical and sensical. But even outside of politics it has its uses to break down complex ideas into something that can be much more easily digested in order to produce a more effective and efficient way of perceiving a world that we don’t know for sure much about. This is why I enjoy college so much more, because it allows me to study various philosophies along with other students of the same discipline which will further enrich all our educations. 

Unfortunately, that’s not how education has always been for me. It has always been some repeat of information that was once interesting that’s now just boring. Or maybe it was something that never interested me in the first place. For this reason, I never believed in our public education system and always treated it as something that I should never take seriously. This negatively reflected in my later efforts as a student and fed into great periods of procrastination where I would wait hours before starting something, such as this paper itself. For some reason though it is the only time I am able to get work done. Perhaps it’s because this has become a learned behavior over the years of neglect for the importance of my work. 

With college I looked to change this. I wanted to become a better student and study more and learn more. I began reading books over the summer and actually enjoyed them. I wanted education to be something I looked forward to, something I enjoyed. This was something I looked forward to over the summer. Many people would ask me how I felt about the school year starting up again. I would reply, “I’m excited, I can’t wait to start the new year and do something new because in college you get to try new things and utilize your independence.” 

 So, I guess that’s the real reason I’m attending CCNY or college in general. Despite my gripes about NYC and its great troubles, I can afford school here and benefit from the resources provided to me by my teachers and fellow students. I want to use these resources to become a better learner and use my knowledge to further my pursuits of education and create even more opportunities for myself and others in the future. The college experience, unlike my earlier encounters with education, has ignited a genuine enthusiasm for learning. My major in philosophy will allow me to delve into the intricacies of human thought and the practical applications of philosophical principles, especially in the realm of politics. Through this journey, I hope to reshape my approach to education, turning it from a mere obligation into a personal quest for growth and enlightenment. While challenges lie ahead, I hope my time at CCNY will infuse me with a renewed commitment to my studies, and a sense of purpose as I strive to make a meaningful difference in the lives of working-class people.