Many of the smartest people you know aren’t much more intelligent than you, they’re just really good at playing games.

GPA, classes, standardized tests; they’re a system of simple procedures that are friendliest to those willing to sell out for them. Now, well past the halfway point of high school, I can safely say that the most important lessons I have learned are well outside the bounds of the classroom. Grades, scores, and my GPA are all things that measure me as a student, but I guarantee that they don’t accurately evaluate me as a person and what is inside my mind. The thoughts and minds of people can’t be measured in 36 points, 1600 points, 4 points, or any points. It’s beyond that.

However, that is the system in which we live. Most of the colleges you’re applying to don’t care about knowing you as a person before accepting you as a student. They don’t have time to. If admissions employees took the time necessary to really know who they’re accepting, the process would never be completed. Admissions departments are usually bound by existing measures for academic success like testing and grades in order to make their selections.

This leaves you with two options: take the easy way out and blame the system for not evaluating you holistically or sell out for the system and do what you have to do to guarantee your spot in college.

For me, that choice is easy. For a lot of post secondary students, college is their ticket to the rest of their life. The late nights, early mornings, and every miserable thing I subject myself to are on account of a series of lessons that are motivated by my goal of achieving the best opportunity to go to college, not necessarily by their value. I have learned more about life from the time and effort I have put into school work than lessons I’ve had in the classroom.

But again, that is the world we live in.  A college degree is an incredibly valuable thing that is directly influenced by the actions you take in high school. If you decide not to try, that is up to you, but those decisions will influence your ability to compete in a high-stakes and vicious job market. Not having some sort of degree is often a death sentence for people with big dreams. Changing the world, doing all the things you want, and having the life you dream of is directly connected to the work you put into the classroom.

The people with the most success are the ones willing to put a piece of themselves away in order to get what they need from the system they live in. As unfair as it is, you have to play the game in order to win. Am I learning like I should be? Probably not. But am I willing to give myself up and play the game for the time being in order to experience the life I want later on? Count on it