Hi,
I have been allowed to write a blog post regarding my experience at TRUE Skool. For us to understand my story, we have to make a few things clear.
In a world full of color, education brings desaturation.
I am autistic, and even with autistic traits, life was tough for me to try at least to keep going.
The current system of schooling and college was especially that, where it has tried to push me to my bloody limits. To force every one of their students to obey, remember their work, and most of all, to force them to be a “perfect robot”, unable to think for themselves.
They’ve treated me as if I was a loser man-child unable to function in a society like this. That was before, whereas I am 20 years old at the time of writing, and a college dropout. I have exceeded myself to be more than what they see me as, and I have and will display my resilience to have my voice heard, both in TRUE Skool out of respect, and against my former high school/college superiors out of “disrespect” and “immaturity”.
Here’s how I was still able to get my voice across even when others abused to power to silence voices like mine.
Do note that every link that I post may be a song associated with the quote.
Glorifying “Addictions”
Before TRUE Skool, I was a reclusive misfit, had no religion, and no real place at home. The only place I could’ve ever gone was online, sitting at a computer for days on end, as the only friends I had were remote, and the only creativity and knowledge that I built myself was all for me to explore on the computer, originally in the form of internet roleplays done in platforms like Roblox, Minecraft, and sometimes Discord.
But when I was introduced to TRUE Skool, I’ll admit, I was hesitant at first. I never trusted a youth organization that any of my parents would tell me about, especially as some youth organization programs end up being big lies to fool their youth. But not TRUE Skool…
Where all of the education and youth organizations fail to understand, TRUE Skool was there, the only ones who not only taught their youth to think creatively but to also embrace the wild side within them.
I’ve remembered going to the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee to use my creativity to tell my story, in the form of film/animation. They considered my pursuit of such a major as an “addiction”, and that I should “think realistically” about what I want to be. I rejected that way of thinking and eventually would find myself a new life underground.
As TRUE Skool has made it clear, the lifestyle of hip-hop was originally considered as a lifestyle of “the underground”. It was a lifestyle that suited me most, especially as someone who never really fit in anywhere. Hip-hop doesn’t have to relate to the music genre, it could be about educating the youth about music, breakdancing, MC-ing, and overall, telling their story.
Resaturating Education
Though there have been many YouTube videos that already cover the flaws of the current American education system that plague the country throughout, TRUE Skool has allowed me to put it all together into one true perspective.
You can’t grade writing. Neither can you grade art.
The critical thing that makes art appealing is subjectivity and the message behind the piece. One of the most major issues I had back when I left university to try to get animation classes in MATC was not only because its curriculum was awful from the start, but also because there was a preconception about drawing. For you to be a great animator, you have to learn to “draw this” or “draw that” before you get to the real animations.
Not only did I not understand why I’d be drawing these things that wouldn’t apply to me in the first place, but it was in that year that I had the most demotivating and the most demoralizing “advice” that I’ve ever gotten.
Sometimes, you’re gonna have to do the things that you don’t wanna do if you wanna succeed.
Though there can be some merit to the advice, it also leads the student into not being happy with their art, and making it feel like it should be “perfect”, just as the client would ask from the artist, which also leads to an unhealthy mindset for an artist.
I didn’t wanna do freelance commission work as an animator. I wanted to make my films, and it was something that MATC never cared about, and neither are they willing to care about.
Another major issue was that during my time at high school, was the issues bullying and ostracizing of the students who were the most “different”. This is not only an issue with the students, but also the teachers. Especially since the faculty would never be willing to hear the victim’s side of the story, and just blame it on the victim for trying to stand up for themselves.
TRUE Skool understands where these issues all put schools and colleges a fault, and they have done well enough to hear everyone’s story and not create “rules” and “restrictions” of what the students want to create but to embrace their creations into learning more about their newfound world. They learned to create things at their own pace, just as I’ve taken my time to create my world for 11 years.
Rampaging the Hall Of Fame
Another thing that TRUE Skool has taught me well was to work my way into being able to speak up and speak out to the world around me.
Never before would I be able to share the connections that I’ve gotten after speaking up to places like Sculpture MKE, the Milwaukee Art Museum, the Milwaukee Film Festival, and other local resources that are open to me. Something that neither UW-Milwaukee nor MATC would ever give to me because of their awful system of “prerequisites”.
To work with the clients and the connections that I’ve gathered out of TRUE Skool is to share a full story of my world, and what it truly means for me, just as it was promised to create what is now called the Polyphonia franchise. And though my internship is over, it still leaves me with the potential to continue on my work and there can be a chance that I could finally complete the life work that I started after June 18th, 2012.
What’s Next?
Even when I’m feeling ready to fight the powers that’d be, I know I wouldn’t be able to do it alone, even as a lone prophet of my own story. However, that is no excuse to not have my story to not be shared regardless. If I want to ask all who read this blog one huge favor, it’s that we’re only just arming up for the winning team, and thus, we’re going for the crown!
If you have a concern about something, speak up about it! You have more control of your life than anyone else’s.
Anything normally taught in colleges is almost always a waste of your time, and anything that they try to tell you can almost be attributed as either a lie or a way to get into your head. You call the shots on what you’d want to be for yourself, and it’s up to you if you want to exceed the shitty expectations that others give you or to be part of a true education at TRUE Skool, where the underground will raise you to a new legacy.
Blog contribution by TRUE Skool Alumni