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Thursday, January 22, 2009

High School Benefits

I went to a high school where all we did was prepare for college (or whatever you wanted to do after high school). It is known nationwide as a college prep school and last year our school had the most perfect scores on the ACT of any schools in the country and a lot of students that went to the Ivy League's after graduation. We took practice tests over and over for the ACT and SAT and were enrolled in as many AP classes as we could be and studies and prepped for AP exams for months (even on Saturdays) we also had an emphasis put on extracurricular when we were in school. As much as grades mattered (and they mattered a lot) we had to make ourselves stand out to others whether it was sports, languages or clubs or even running a charity event every year (which we were all encouraged to do and they usually were a huge success).

One thing though that I really think helped us was guest speakers. No matter where we wanted to go to college or what we planned on doing, our high school had someone come in and talk to us about it. There were even lectures about Heavy Equipment Schools for Active Duty Military. You could see the schedule of people who were coming in for the upcoming month and you could sign up for it and get excused from class or your sport or whatever event you had and you could go (but you also had to write a paper on the speaker so people wouldn't just skip class to go). It was very helpful. A few people I know went to the lecture about Heavy Equipment Careers (which is something that I had never heard about before that) and they had a lot of Heavy Equipment Career Information for the people that were interested and wanted to learn more about it.

Overall, even though in high school it felt like they were pushing us so much and that we barely could breathe with all of the college stuff they shoved down our throats and activities and grades, I think I, as well as everyone else I know that I went to school with (which is about 1000 other people in my grade) got into the school of our choice or the plan that we had for ourselves after graduation. So I guess I have my high school to thank for a lot of my opportunities and also success.




Friday, January 16, 2009

Insurance: Getting to know it Before It's too late

Over the last holiday my family and I were talking about different kinds of insurance. I'm not sure how It was brought up, but my grandparents were telling us about insurance when they were younger and how it has changed today and how no one ever helped them chose which car or health insurance was right for them, they just needed to make that decision on their own and hope it went okay. Then knowing what they knew, they helped my dad and his brothers figure everything out when they were older and needed guidance and (hopefully) my dad will do the same for me because as of right now he pays for my insurance still because I am covered under his as a student. But one day sooner or later I will have to branch out on my own and hopefully by then I will be educated enough to make a smart decision (with his help of course ha).

Insurance quotes are confusing to me. You can go online and look into them but there is always small or fine print that you don't get when you are looking them up or they are just an estimate. It is hard to get a full grasp on everything. The good thing about looking up quotes online is that you can compare them to one another. I was helping out my grandparents the other day because they were calling around about senior auto insurance and I couldn't even believe it. I told them that they could just look online and they were so impressed. It was weird because I would have gone to the internet first thing and it probably wouldn't have occurred to me to call places and talk to people about it.

We also looked up temporary short term health insurance quotes and talked about the pros and cons . It is nice to hear about their experiences with different kinds and get some health insurance leads before I actually have to go out into the real world and get my own insurance. I know people say you have to live and learn and sometimes make mistakes, but I would rather just learn from their mistakes (or the mistakes that they didn't make) and use that for my benefit and guidance when I have to do it on my own.





 
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