Campus Safari #4

For my Campus Safari, I chose to ask my CC Ashley about becoming a CC. If you want to become a CC there are a few steps you have to take. First you apply on Res Life. Next, you will have a sit down interview by yourself and then after that, you will have a group interview. If they like what they see you will get a call and find out what building you are assigned too. If you are a CC you have free housing, your own room, you move in 2 weeks earlier, and you get a paycheck (which most of us didn’t know about). But with becoming a CC, there are responsibilities. You have to take action if you feel something is wrong on your floor, people will come to you if they have problems, and you also work the front desk making sure people sign guests in and out. This is Ashley’s 2^nd semester of being a CC and she loves it.

Are You a Procrastinator?

The biggest idea that I have been thinking about lately is time management and how people spend their time. So I knew that was the question I was going to ask. The question I asked was “Are you a procrastinator or do you like to get your work done early?” My roommate and friend Briana was the first person I asked. Her exact answer was, “I just procrastinate because I’m lazy.” My best friend Jessica who doesn’t go to this school answered, “I get my work done early because I’m in the school’s play and if I waited until the last minute I would never get it done.” My friend Kayla said, “It goes both ways for me. On simple assignments I will get them done early but for papers, I do those the night before.” My other roommate, Meredith answered, “As soon as I get back from the class I do the homework so I have time to relax later on.” My friend Dave said, “I procrastinate a lot and sometimes do the homework before the class.” Taylor from our class answered, “I get my assignment done early so I don’t have to worry about it later.” My friend Kelsey answered, “I’m a procrastinator but recently I’ve been trying to get out of that habit.” My friend Courtney said, “As soon as I get the assignment I get it done. It feels so good to get your homework out of the way instead of leaving it for last minute.” My friend Jennifer said, “I am probably the biggest procrastinator you will ever meet.” Lastly I asked my friend Chelsea. She said, “I procrastinate like it’s my job.” Some people will always be procrastinator. Some people say they work better under pressure. I could go both ways. Some assignments I will get done right away while others I wait until the last minute. It’s such a bad habit to have since we’re in college now and the workload is going to get harder. It feels better to get your assignments out of the way so you don’t have that weighing on your shoulders.

Managing My Time

Of course the week we do the self-study I was kind of mobbed with homework. The weeks before came a little easier to me! The week of the self-study was when I had all tests and papers due that week. My hours of homework and studying came out to be around 22 hours. When I was doing homework in the week, it didn’t feel like it was 22 hours of work. I just paced myself and took breaks whenever I could and it actually made time fly by. I get distracted easily. One of my biggest distractions is my friends. In high school, I would rather go and hangout with my friends and do homework last minute. I find myself still doing it now but I’m trying to learn that I need to keep up my grades and get all of my homework done early and have time with my friends. Another HUGE distraction is my cell phone. I keep my phone right near me when I’m doing homework and the second I hear it go off, I stop what I’m doing to look at it. Yes, having you email, facebook, and twitter is a great thing on your phone, but not when you’re doing homework. I check that thing so much during homework and it really gets me distracted. What I need to do is turn my phone on silent during homework so I can get my homework and studying done without stopping. My last distraction is noise. I honestly cannot read if I hear noises. If the T.V or music is on when I’m supposed to be reading, I can’t get my reading done because I focus so much on what’s going on in the background. One thing I spent most of my time on was breaks (going out, hanging out with friends, going to eat, etc.) I just need to manage my time more wisely. To change or improve my time management habits, I need to focus on what needs to be done instead of focusing on what’s going on around me, for example when my friends call me to hangout. There is always time to go out with friends but I just need to get my homework over with first so I can relax and not freak out about not doing it.

Campus Safari #9

When the Club Fair kept getting pushed back, I just kept waiting and waiting for it to finally be rescheduled! The first club I stopped at was College Against Cancer. I've known that I've wanted to join this club since before school even started. College Against Cancer is getting involved in activities like Relay for Life. Relay for Life is a walk-a-thon to raise money and awareness for cancer. There was no doubt in my mind that I wouldn't join this club. Cancer has been a big part of my life because my grandmother and aunt had it and I want to help out as much as I could in this club. Another club I signed up for was SFTO, Southern's Future Teachers Organization. I was not going to sign up because I thought it was just for students in the education department but when I found out anyone can join and what it was about, I had to sign up. SFTO goes to school's and reads to children and even goes to the Ronald McDonald House to read to them. I love working with kids and don't know if I'm going to go into education, but I knew this would be a great club. I also signed up for Peer Mentoring and Habitat for Humanity. Peer Mentoring is for older students to help first-year students. Peer Mentors is also for younger students to have someone older to talk to instead of talking to adults. Habitat for Humanity is a club to help communities out. They go out and help people who need their houses rebuilt. It's a great opportunity to get involved.

"A"mazing Blogs

The first blog I read was “Nina’s Blog.” I went to her post “What College Means to Me.” I wanted to see what input she had about college other than my own. I love how she kept a positive attitude throughout the whole blog post about college. She hardly said anything negative, which a lot of people tend to do about college. She stayed positive and wrote about the new experiences and opportunities, meeting new people, and keeping her grades up. Reading all of the positives ideas in her post made me want to read the whole thing. It’s good to have positive outlook on college because this is where you are for the next 4 years and Nina’s blog presented that very well! She definitely deserves an A!

The next blog that I would give an A is “Hannah Exploring the University.” The blog that stuck out the most for me was “SCSU 5^th Annual Service Day.” Not only did Hanna tell what she did, she went beyond that. Hanna gave background information on the site she attended which was the Pardee Morris House. I don’t think anyone else gave background information on their site so that really stuck out for me.

The last blog I would give an A is “Dissecting the Mind of Steph.” Before I even decided to read a blog post, I looked at her whole blog. Steph goes above and beyond the requirements. Just be looking at her post I can tell she goes over the 300 words. The blog post I chose to read from her was “Pumping Iron and Breaking a Sweat.” Before I started reading, I didn’t know this was a Campus Safari. I love how she didn’t just write Campus Safari and the # like I do. On top of that, she went beyond the 100 words. She really persuaded me to join the gym at our school so that’s something I’m going to look into. 

Interesting Professional Blogs

As soon as I read this assignment, I knew the first blog I would google would be a cooking blog! Ever since I saw the movie Julie and Julia and how Julie blogged about trying the recipes of Julia Child, I always wanted to look at a cooking blog. The first blog that popped up was For the Love of Cooking. I really liked how the blog was presented and it was a blog from Blogger.com. There are so many categories you can press that can take you to different kinds of recipes so you didn’t have to search all the way down to find the one you wanted. The blog was very professional in my eyes. It gives you step-by-step instructions and shows you pictures of the product all the way to the finished product.  The instructions were made very simple so anyone could cook! This is a blog I would show my mother because she loves to cook and try new things.

The next blog I searched was a movie blog. I clicked on MTV Movies Blog. The blog is very well organized. It doesn’t just have movie blog posts, but it has video clips from The Emmy’s, interviews, and trailers. I’m a movie freak so I also new I was going to search this blog. I also clicked on this blog because MTV is very popular so I knew I could get some good things on here. Just like the cooking blog, there were categories on the side to make searching easier. This blog really stuck out to me because it uses videos and each blog post is different from the next.

Both blogs were different in their owns ways. In the cooking blog, it was very simple with simple colors and I love all things simple. It was very neat and easy to access. The MTV blog stuck to the colors black and red and used more videos than pictures. These blogs interest me because they stick to a main topic unlike my blog, which is different every week. I think others would find these blogs interesting because they both give off useful information on topics a lot of people like.

Campus Safari #17

Since I’ve heard about the day of service I knew I was going to participate in it. I joined my friend’s Inquiry class and went with them to their sites. Our first stop was West River. For that task we had to go around the sidewalks and clean up any garbage. We went around and picked up anything we could find, raked leaves, and we fixed up a fence so a store that had a lot of plants growing all over it. Some people in the town were thankful for what we were doing while others shouted things like, “Why don’t you go clean up your own streets at Southern.” No one really minded what they were saying because we knew we were doing a good thing by helping out the community. Our second job was to go to a school and clean up the garden on the roof. We took all of the weeds and little trees and threw them away so they could start over. I’m terrified of heights but it wasn’t bad at all. We stayed there for about an hour and got a lot accomplished. It was a really good experience and it feels good to help out the community.

Time Flies

Time Management. Some of us are good at time management and others, like myself, are not. In college, it’s all about time. For every hour in class, study 2 or 3 hours. When I hear that, I automatically freak out. To be honest, I’ve never been a good studier. We’ve been talking in class about keeping 30 hours in our schedule for homework/studying/etc. To me 30 hours seems impossible but really, it’s not. It’s all about time. The article Time Management (http://www.studygs.net/timman.htm) was just what I needed to read. You need to make a schedule. I personally think without one, I’d be all over the place, not knowing when assignments are due or when I have a test. I could fail and trust me I don’t want that. Throughout high school, I could pass with studying here and there or maybe skipping a few homework assignments, but I don’t want to fall back into those patterns. YOU NEED SPACE. Plain and simple. You need time for studying and time for breaks. I will tell you, I can get so distracted that I will just stop my homework and do something else. For example, I keep my phone right near me when I do work (yes, even as I’m typing this) and if I get a text, email, or a facebook or twitter notification, I have to check it right then and there. It’s not good. I need to start putting my phone away from me or maybe even put it on silent. Under one of the paragraphs in the article it asked, “What is one distraction that causes you to stop studying?” Mine would be my phone and friends. I room with my best friend and sometimes we distract each other from doing our work. Both of us agreed that we need to make better habits out of studying and homework. Another article I enjoyed was Making a Schedule: The Importance of Making a Schedule. (http://www.howtostudy.org/resources_skill.php?id=6 second one down) After last class and how our assignment is to track our schedule for a week, I want to really set aside and make a schedule for myself. I procrastinate so much and it’s not going to be good in the long run. For future jobs I need to be able to have good time management and even for college. I don’t want to be up all night doing a paper. It’s important to sleep so you are energized. Why keep a schedule? Why write down you daily activities? How will this help me? It will keep you organized. You can put in spaces to study and do work and spaces for breaks. That's why a schedule is so efficient.