As I walked into the senior Theory of Knowledge class, I went to the teacher and asked for a student with horrible handwriting. Immediately, the class directed my attention to senior Rustin Golshan.
“As long as my first letter [and] my last letter are legible, the rest of the inside [of] the word can just be relatively distinguishable,” Golshan said. “I write really quickly too, so I just don’t see the point in going back and making that little, small adjustment. For me to actually go and make my handwriting legible, it takes a lot of effort. I have to go very slow and detailed.”
While most kids’ handwriting improves as they age, Golshan was the opposite.
“[I] started off elementary school with chicken scratch,” Golshan said. “It was always terrible. Around middle school it got better, but then once I hit eighth grade, it just got worse. It got so bad because it was more efficient, [and] I realized that I don’t need to have good handwriting. [It] can just take too much time.”
In almost every group project, ranging from making posters for IB Higher Level (HL) Math to IB English Language and Literature diagrams where the person with the best handwriting has to be elected, Golshan has rarely been considered as a candidate.
“Now it’s gotten to the point where even if I have to try to make my handwriting distinct [and] legible, it’s really hard to,” Golshan said. “Even for circumstances that I need to have it legible, like a project, so many times I just pass off those duties to somebody else.”
On top of teachers taking off points for his bad handwriting, Golshan said that students “just know [his handwriting] is terrible,” but he believes having “bad” or “rushed” handwriting can actually point to how occupied a person is within their activities.
“I know people with really good handwriting who are a lot more detailed in whatever they do,”
Golshan said. “People with relatively bad handwriting, like me, they’ll just get it done. They won’t spend a lot of time on it. A doctor is very busy, and they’re notorious for having very bad handwriting. So I always thought the worse handwriting you have, the more rushed and busier you are.”
Despite bad handwriting, comments from students and group projects, Golshan still holds a fondness for writing.
“I really enjoy writing,” Golshan said. “With my handwriting and the process of writing, it feels fluid. But that fluidity comes with a cost, and that cost is terrible handwriting.”
