AESHA ALJAMAL | CONTRIBUTOR

First of all, I want to welcome everyone in here, teachers, counselors, friends and families welcome to our graduation ceremony of 2017.

 

I am very thankful for all of my teachers in the Aurora Central Career Academy and for my family.

Without you, your help, your support and your love I wouldn’t be able to be where I’m today.

Thanks from the bottom of my heart.

I want to thank God that was with me step by step.

 

Not everyone in here may know me, so. I’m going to introduce myself.

I’m Aisha Aljamal, a peaceful Muslim girl.

 

I’m Palestinian, and I was born in Iraq.

Yes, I’m from Occupied Palestine,

Palestine I have never seen but I’m still connected to.

 

I have been in America for 1 year and 10 months.

Before I moved to the US, I lived in Turkey for 3 years.

I was not allowed to go to school there.

So I just sat home waiting to move to the United States to complete my education, and to find my future.

 

I finally came to America and I was extremely excited.

When I first arrived at Aurora Central, I was a junior and it was the end of 3rd quarter of 2016.

The thing was, I came with 0 credits and I had no high school transcript from other countries…

Which left me frustrated and on top of that my English was not very good.

 

I was sad…This allowed me to learn and succeed through failure.

 

The end of the 2017 school year is here, and I am happy that I have finished so many credits.

But I am still set back because I didn’t graduate on time.

 

I still didn’t give up… I persevered.

I believed that I had to be patient and as we say..

“Dreams don’t work unless we do.”

 

When I came to registration in August I got a call, that was a new program at Central for students who are behind in credits.

 

I was very excited and happy… That’s what I really needed!

I agreed and was enrolled in a full school day of 7 classes.

I also finished 11 classes online

I really worked hard,

I got tired and bored, But…

I have recovered all of my missing credits,

I achieved what I wanted

and here I am today!

 

At the end, I want to tell you guyss,

It is okay to have difficult stints, and we must accept it…this is part of life.

but don’t ever give up.

 

Aesha has plans to move to Sweden in the near future to continue using her unyielding work ethic to influence the community around her.