Your Chance to Grade My Essay!

The following is one of two writing prompts given to all of the students at my middle school today. It was practice for the writing proficiency. I told them it was going to be a grade. (Not lying! For MY students it WILL be a grade.)

I take all proficiency and state standardized tests along with my students. Call me crazy, but I feel like it keeps me young (plus I see what the test or writing prompt is from THEIR point of view.) After reading my essay, YOU get a chance to be a teacher for a day and give me a grade. Tell me what you think!

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Topic A: Every day each of us is presented with opportunities to do what is right. Tell about one of the opportunities that you have had to do the right thing. Explain what you did or did not do, what happened, and what you learned from the experiences.


Here's my response:

When I was a junior in high school I had the chance to do what is right, but I’m ashamed to say I didn’t.

My high school, Chaparral, was playing a night football game against our rivals, Valley High School. My friends and I drove in my car to Valley for the game. While in the school parking lot walking towards the bleachers, we noticed a purse on the roof of a car. I walked over to it and looked around. In the distance I could see a group of kids walking into the game.


I went to call out to them, but my friend D---- said to wait because it might have money in it. I gave in to peer pressure and didn't call to the group walking in. One of my friends grabbed the purse and we all ran back to my car.

As we left the parking lot the owner of the purse and her friends must have seen us because suddenly a car peeled out and pulled up behind mine. It honked, brighted its lights, and tried to catch up with us. My friends screamed and yelled for me to gun it.

Instead of tossing the purse out of the window, we drove like maniacs up an down the residential streets around Valley. We finally came to a stop when they ran us off of the road up onto the sidewalk, and I hit three garbage cans, narrowly missing a street light.


Two scary-looking guys jumped out of their car, pounded on my window and yelled and cursed at us. Terrified, I rolled down my window a little and pushed the purse out. While they were going through the purse to see if everything was there (there was only make-up, a house key, and her ID) I backed up out of the garbage cans and we left.


I regret not making a better choice that night. I should have called out to the owner of the purse instead of giving in to my friend. We were lucky we didn't wreck or the guys didn't hurt us. This incident has haunted me for more than twenty-three years and taught me that regardless of what my friends say, I need to do what is right.
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Now YOU be the teacher. Did I answer the prompt correctly? Was my essay clear and well-organized? Was the idea a correct response to the questions asked? Was my punctuation, grammar (I'm bad at keeping my verb tenses straight), and spelling correct? How was my writer's voice?

Hope you enjoy being teacher for the day. Now I get to grade 240 student essays! Joy.

Photo credit: Corrina Terry