“It ain’t over until I win.”
Danielle C. Saylor
By Tommie Saylor
Kennedy High School Principal
Last year I wrote a newsletter
article that I would like to again share with you today:
When I was a young teacher, my wife
worked late afternoons, leaving me to care for our children in the evening
hours. One evening as I was getting my daughter ready for bed, we decided to
play a simple board game before heading upstairs (which later became our normal
bedtime routine).
I do not remember the name of the
game, but what I do remember is thinking that if I hurry up and win the game, I
can get it over with and quickly get her to bed. You see, as a young teacher I
had lessons to prepare and papers to grade. So I pushed for the win, and won
the game relatively quickly, as would be expected – she was only 6 years old.
Thinking that we were done, I told my
daughter that I was going to put the game away and she needed to head upstairs
to bed, I would be there shortly to tuck her in. My daughter looked at me and said,
“But it ain’t over until I win.” Intrigued, I decided to play the game with her
again – and again and again – not giving her an inch just to see how far she
was willing to go.
An hour or so later she finally won a
game, stood up, grabbed her “blankie” in hand and said, “Now I’m ready for bed.”
On that day, my little girl taught me
a lesson – it ain’t over until I win. The path to success is long and hard, and
you do not lose and/or fail until you quit. Never give up and never give in
until success is firmly in your grasp. All of your past failures are
meaningless once you have won.
It ain’t over until you win.
Often the difference between success
and failure is vigilance. It is easy to throw up your hands and quit. Only the
brave drive on in the face of adversity.
Let this be the motto for Kennedy
High School. It ain’t over until we win. Until Kennedy High School is the best
school in the state, in the nation. Until others arrive at our doorstep asking,
“How did you do it?”
Our individual efforts are the only
thing standing in the way of our goal.
Remember, their future is in our
hands. Making Kennedy the school of Choice. Excellence by design.
