Page 24 - Sorry, We're Not Hiring Any Visionaries Today

SORRY, WE’RE NOT HIRING ANY VISIONARIES TODAY
I remember getting my act together in college because I knew that Mom and Dad were paying for it, so I worked and studied like crazy, and I got a lot of As, some Bs, and just a few Cs. I took college much more seriously than high school.
So Michael, did you fail anything in high school?
MICHAEL: I failed a lot. I failed math pretty badly. I failed French terribly. I took grade 13 French twice. I bombed out of grade nine French. In terms of chemistry, in grade 9, I got a 50, and I got a 51 in biology. I got -2 on French dictee once. They took off more marks than I thought were possible because I made too many mistakes. Negative two: think about that!
I got into the school I wanted, but barely, because I screwed up an English test. I begged my teacher to give me the 80 that I needed for English to get into Ryerson for radio and TV.
When I got to radio and TV, I had a great time with it. However, I recall using Cole’s notes on an essay in a first-year English course. I thought my writing was terrible, and I felt I’d get an X on this essay. But I didn’t realize I was going to get an X for plagiarism. So I got this big red X on my essay, but not for the reason I thought. Looking back, I was an idiot, but I was ashamed to put Cole’s Notes in the footnotes.
I bombed Television Broadcasting. I was terrible at the switching machine in the studio. I couldn’t do it — it was far too technical. I tried selling ads for The Eyeopener, the Ryerson student newspaper; I think I sold two ads. I left Ryer- son, and my first job was $8 an hour packaging records at a children’s record company
ANDREW: How did you graduate high school with all these low marks?
MICHAEL: Fortunately, I was good in English, and I got the 80-something grade needed to at least get past the first bar. Truthfully, most of my time in grades 8 through 13 was not academic in nature. I just chased girls and
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