Dear miss mick;


I am writing to you because I have found myself in a fix. As you well off already know, it is the end of school year & more importantly; time for the senior class of 2007 to graduate! It goes without saying that my time spent always was for the better, although brief at best. But isn’t high school brief as is? Andrew Leonard and I: students who transferred to Platt the beginning of our senior year from Wilcox Tech are very thankful of the schools good will into allowing us to attend on such short notice. Both he and I participated in C and AP level curriculum. We’ve worn the almost 4 semesters, a midterm, and a plethora of homework and are preparing for those finals in classes where a B+ wasn’t enough. Unfortunately our problem is that regardless of how well we do, we will not graduate because of lacking Community Service.
Before I continue I would just like to let you know that I am well aware of the idea behind C.S. and absolutely respect it as a graduation requirement…for students who’ve participated all four years at Platt that is. It’s a way for state and towns to get their youth giving something back for their free education. It’s a small price to pay at that, for many other countries have much less than that at their disposal. In compliance Andrew and I utilized our past histories as a resource for this service (as many would.) Both of us were in the Carpentry class of 2007 and had done 250 hours of work with our instructor and fellow classmates from the periods of about August / September 2005 to May / June 2007 in Wallingford, CT building houses for the less fortunate sponsored by habitat for humanity. Just because I had felt unsure I wanted to O.K. this substantial amount of work with Mr. Grady and he approved. Only for several days later to be notified that they will not count for anything. I quarreled…well not quarreled as so much wished to speak with someone higher in authority. I was referred to Mr.Gafny and explained my side (I brought Andrew there too because I felt that he should be aware of what was going on just as much as myself.) Mr.Gafny responded and his reasoning was the same as Mr.Gradys; “The work was done in school. It doesn’t count, it’s as it were no different than participating with the English class.” Several minutes into conversation though he gave in, allowing 10 hours of our some eight months of work to count. (He wasn’t sure if he even could allow that or not.) Don’t get me wrong, I like Mr.Gafny and I like Mr. Grady. They are how I got here in the first place, they are both very nice members of the faculty and they are just doing their jobs.
Regardless though…I found that such logic was absurd. How can someone compare work which helps people live with shelter and educates at the same time to helping out the guidance department or doing work in class? There is no rational thought, just text book definitions. I would also like to establish here that I do understand Carpentry is a class of its own and work is done on school hours under school jurisdiction. Yet the work that Wilcox gets for students who go out for their trade is paid. I.E. deck jobs, dock construction, porch remodeling, even mock houses for the police academy for training, and all the while this work for habitat was not a paid job. The organization itself is nonprofit (Christian) and it consists strictly of volunteers. Wilcox Carpentry gladly did so to volunteer us students. For the experience gained would be proportional to the work done, and efforts be paid by the knowledge of knowing that you helped keep someone safe. Wilcox didn’t even have required Community Service because it being a stat school was realized that projects done for free are beneficial for the community and also necessary for a legitimate education. Andrew Leonard and I have only participated at the school for one year and I find it unfair that the approximated 250 hours of service and back breaking labor be accounted for proportional to 4%: 10 hours. If to be proportional were to be justified then we technically should be given 25%: 62.5 hours –our attendance only being for a quarter of a Platt students full High School career. But that is all just being technical. I want to be realistic, I want to be fair, and that’s why I came here and also why Andrew did too. We wanted to be treated realistically and fairly. In our current situation that is not the case; we require (presumably) 10 hours of community service, (if not 20) to complete by Sunday. Additional to that both of us work 30 hours a week at our jobs and have finals for classes and college concerns on our minds. Our fates are on the line solely based upon a few hand signatures and what the Board of Education considers to be service to ones community.
It just doesn’t make sense to me, even giving blood while on school grounds (The only way a 17 year old can,) doesn’t count as service to the community. It’s saving lives and still like all mentioned before; has no weight. A deadline is near and now I’d like something tangible, I’d like a solution. I need something to delineate the status of Andrews as well as my status because everything leading up to now has gotten us nowhere. I really would like to be able to walk up that stage and see my family and friends watching me and also to watch my friends and classmates. Four years have led up to this and it would be the most depressing thing to see it brought to a halt by definitions.


Sincerely;

You need to learn when not to use semicolons....

i read the first line, next!

You should replace the semicolon after "Dear miss mick" and after "Sincerely" with a comma ",". Also in "hand signatures and what the Board of Education considers to be service to ones community. ", ones should be "one's". Good job though.

Not to mention a letter of that size should be more than one paragraph.

Eh?!

[quote author=Joe[x86] link=topic=16761.msg171311#msg171311 date=1185948932]
Not to mention a letter of that size should be more than one paragraph.

Eh?!
[/quote]

It is more than one, though the paragraph indentations were probably lost when he was copy/pasting it over.

looks like it was 4 paragraphs before the forum ate it