I am 19 years old, from Damascus, Syria.
I was studying in the 10th grade when the war broke out in Syria. My life was easy and comfortable. I had everything I wanted.
I came to Denmark in march 2015. It was difficult in the beginning, but it became easier with time.After me and my family got residence permit, we moved to Aarhus and I started to attend language school. I finished the language school after 1,5 or two years, and I started 10th grade.
I applied to study in high school, but they didn’t accept me. They said that they were worried that I could not understand the lectures as I had not been in Denmark that long and that my Danish was maybe not good enough. They then invited me to take a test to see if they could accept me.
I took the exam. We were 50 persons who took this test and only three of us passed it. I was one of them.
After some time the principal called to tell me that I did very good in the test. He said that normally he didn’t call all the people who took the tests, but he thought I should know how good I was. But still he said that the high school could not accept me as a student because they were still worried that I might not understand. It was very strange! And I felt it was unfair.
I’m a good student, and I’m sure that I could easily understand the lectures in high school. Yesterday I had an exam where I got the grade 10 (B) without even preparing so much for it. Now I am studying in the 10th grade again and at HF (Higher Preparatory Examination Programme) at the same time. I also help my father in his sweet shop in my spare time.
My teacher couldn’t understand why I came back to the 10th grade. He said, “what are you doing here?”