While most students groan at the mere thought of doing work during vacation, I had one of the best summers of my life by appreciating the intellectual advancements made through summer work and summer school.

When someone asks me how my vacation went, I can tell them that wasting away in my room staring at homework was the best vacation I could have asked for. Despite my passion for studying, I was dragged on a flight to Hawaii, but thankfully, I enjoyed finishing summer assignments there instead of snorkeling in crystal clear oceans and spending quality time with family.

In addition, although I started my detailed assignments in the last week or so of the summer, I know I can fully retain the knowledge for the eight months between the time I complete my history summer work and the AP test in May. I’ll definitely be able to recall what the encomienda system did in the colonies when I see that question on the AP test.

I also learned valuable prioritizing skills, as I struggled deciding between doing my assignments or other educational opportunities. In hindsight, choosing summer work over an internship or summer program was the right choice to make— I grew as a student by answering questions for APUSH summer work far more than I would attending classes at a top college or getting real world experience.

My parents suggested that I volunteer at the local hospital in the summer, but I don’t think they understand how valuable and meaningful summer assignments are compared to community service.

All of the positive word-of-mouth about summer school convinced me to stop trying so hard in my semester courses in hopes of getting into remediation class. I’ve also persuaded my friends to do the same so that we could save time—32 weeks, to be precise—by cramming a year’s worth of information into a few weeks. I’m sure anyone who sees my transcript will understand my ingenious plan right away.

Something that my friends and I look forward to each day of summer school are the movies that teachers show in class. The movie selection indicates the immense amount of time our teacher spent planning out the curriculum.

If anything, I want to thank my teacher for being so considerate as to making the classroom dark and turning on background music for me to catch up on sleep that I lost trying to make it to school on time.

Throughout this meaningful break, I learned many important lessons. The most influential realization I had was that summer school and summer work will be the necessary building blocks for my successful future.