I Failed My A-levels and Was Kicked Out of My School... It Was the Best Thing that Has Happened to Me Yet

I’ll never forget it. Standing in line with countless other kids whose envelopes had been marked like leprosy. We stood, waiting for a one-to-one talk with the vice principal, who would inevitably tell us we must leave the school. Our grades were not to a high enough standard to stay. Most of the students were crying. Angry mothers stood at their side, ready to rip anyone apart who dared to get in the way of their beloved, and "academically gifted," child’s future. Sorry hun, your kid was the one doing Jager bombs and tequila every Thursday night at the bar down the street.

Unlike other students, I was ready to go, even though I had no idea where. I didn’t like school: the cliques, the unjustifiable stacks of homework, the gossip, the unnecessary pressure. Life is about more than exams. My life, at that time, was about trying to get my way out of a pit of depression and help friends in a worse shape than myself. We were just all trying to survive, and it felt like school was trying to give us small doses of cyanide, consistently. There was always something that you needed to be worrying about. So I felt a freedom amongst the loss. I knew I would never set foot in a high school again, and it didn’t bother me—despite having no clue what would come next.

I had no A-levels, and was being bumped out of school after doing a crap job of my AS examinations. Well, not so crap when you consider that I barely attended school weekly. I took my parents' frightful expressions like a shot of cortisone, spurring me on in the challenge of it, into a new future. If I had gotten back into school, I would have known there was a horrific year in store. Now, my life was my own. In a strange sense, this was a rescue, as it may be for you, too. You flunked the exams—maybe it was a slip up and all you want is to do it again (so do it! Don’t be afraid to be persistent). However, maybe you’ve been really struggling with the classes, or with school. Maybe you just find yourself too distracted, or life is touch at the moment. Whatever the reason, and whatever people say—it isn’t the be-all-end-all. You will be fine, and in fact you will be better than fine discovering something more suited to you. Move on, move up.

Then I went to the local campus, because I “needed some sort of qualification under my belt.” Hilarious. I chose the only course still available, and went for all of three months. I used to get an ovation for attending classes, from both teachers and students. And I usually turned up within the last hour or so, despite living 400 meters from the building. I hated the course, the people hated it too and the whole attitude in the class was pessimistic. The attitude rang out as "I’m here so my parents don’t complain. Then I’m going to leave and get blootered. Then I’m going to get pregnant. Then I’m going to get a house from the council." I am not stereotyping tech, or tech students when I say this, as I have an understanding many people believe that tech is attended by the congregation of underachievers from the local town with such attitudes. No. People in other classes were incredibly committed and hardworking. Plus, when I say hardworking, I mean it. They really did do the equivalent amount of work to A-levels, and the most of it in their spare time. It was hard going. Courses, and doing more practical work in your own time, may be what you need. Unfortunately, it wasn’t what I needed, and my class was one with a very poor attitude, perhaps inspired by teachers with the same attitude.

So, doing a B-tec just wasn’t for me. I never returned after Christmas. Instead, I began to write. Write and write and write. My parents would come in and yell at me lying on the sofa doing research and writing on my laptop. They didn’t understand that I was developing, learning, and sharpening a skill of my own better than I could have done within a classroom. Mentally, I was not in a sound enough place just yet to go back to that. Eventually, I picked up a small part time job. Then I had an opportunity to go to Africa and teach. I got another job. Then a third, writing all the while. A year after leaving high school, I got on a plane to spend the next eight months working and learning within a new culture and country. A country that is healing me, right at this very second. I sit listening to birdsong, African radio, and children playing outside as I write, with such gratitude to the wrinkly vice principal that kicked me out of her school. Within a month of being here, I wrote a lengthy email to a few universities telling them why I had no exams, and why I wanted to attend university anyway.

And guess what?

I got accepted to the course I want, in the perfect university for me.

This is just a summarised snippet of how the year and a half has been since I failed my exams and was given the boot from my school. There was a lot of challenges. You will have them too, but they will be so epically good for you.

Your eyes are opened to how fake friends are. How fake life and relationships are in general. Leaving high school, I left most people behind. The majority of people didn’t bother keeping in touch, and I didn’t bother chasing. I don’t feel alone though; I felt liberated… free. I made new friends on my travels over the year. Being at home more often also drove me bonkers, to the point that I had to move out. This was the best decision ever. Of course, at times it was far from easy, but I escaped difficult situations that I couldn’t have otherwise. Staying at school can make you miserable, and keep you trapped in an ugly cage that really only exists from what people keep telling you, and you believe.

People tell you that you need to go to Uni.

You need to go at the same time as everyone else.

You need A levels.

You need to stop wasting time.

Maybe you even tell yourself these things. The truth is, you don’t need any of this. It’s the boring norm, and just because you don’t follow it does not make you predestined to become homeless or unsuccessful. You can make it. You can still be what you want to be with hard work and commitment—you may just need to do so from another angle. Keep ploughing on, doing what you’re doing. Only you know yourself. Only you have any sort of idea where you are going in your life or what you are doing.

It’s totally okay to take some time out to breathe. School, work, qualifications—they aren’t everything. Put your health first for a while if that’s what is needed. Take a step back to regain the passion and intrigue you once held for a given topic. Get to know yourself, get to know the world. There is more lasting success in discovering who you are, where you are and where you want to be than trudging along through the education system until you get the somewhat decent job you’ve slaved your life over. It probably won’t be so exciting once you grab hold of it, because you’ve never taken risk, or known the weight of loss to know the worth of hard work on your own accord, and gain through an independent decision to work. You need to work because you want to work. Success is not success if you have not been passionate whilst doing it. School is a waste of your time and life, if you are genuinely miserable and just breathing and studying so that on day you might be happy, with an okay job. School is worth it when you see the value of education, the joy in learning. I had lost that, until it was taken from me and I could take a step back. I could realise exactly who I wanted to be and what I wanted to do, when my head was pulled out of the books. I gave me enough time to look around, and see the direction I was heading. I was given enough time to recalibrate, and then bury my head back down into hard work—knowing my bearings and my direction. Knowing that I was doing exactly what I wanted and needed to do. Not what teachers and peers were telling me to do.

And I was doing it for me. Not my parents, not the people who would judge me, not my teachers, not my friends.

It’s a lot more difficult to work hard while someone is leading you by the hand. Always a step ahead, always telling you how to think, how to live and what to do next. Quite frankly, it’s tiring and it’s distracting. Know the direction yourself. Know how to get there yourself. Then, and only then, begin to work for it with all your heart.