Youth Talk

My younger sister, Athena, is very artistically talented. While nine-year-old me struggled to draw stick figures, my little sister at that age had mastered painting and was working on sketching.

While I consistently delivered Cs in Art (not my finest moment) she hasn’t seen less than a grade A. And, now that she’s 14, she’s only flourished even more as a budding artist.

While obviously far from perfect it still genuinely amazes me to see all the stunning pieces she’s able to produce at such a young age. Therefore, when choosing her GCSEs, it seemed like a natural fit for her to select Art as one of her two options. And yet she chose to brush aside her natural passion and talent for the conventional norm.

Despite my parents strong approval for Art she chose to study Economics and Business Studies. I was slightly disappointed by this choice, which unfortunately is highly common in today’s society.

We as a generation are constantly pressured with the challenges of meeting yesterday’s expectations.

We all have to take the ‘right’ subjects, rejecting what people term as ‘soft subjects’. After all, who needs a GCSE in Drama when society will only value you if you become a doctor or a lawyer?

It is a sad reality that those who say choose to study Music and DT will be dismissed as less academic and with less aspirations?

Who cares about considering that the aforementioned subjects are amongst the most difficult GCSE options and, therefore, indicate the person’s immense talent?

Thankfully this story has a happy ending. My sister dropped Business in favour of Art. Let’s hope more people follow what they actually want to pursue rather than go with the flow.