Baruch Scholars 2016

As a Baruch scholar, I have the advantage of having a surplus amount of faculty and staff to advice and aid me throughout my time at Baruch. This came in handy with the Community Service Project. When I first heard about this project, I was absolutely lost in searching for a non-profit. Luckily, my advisor, Mr. Medina, and my peer mentor sparked a large amount of ideas to consider as well  as show us tools made for peering people to non-profits. With that, forming the group and finding a project satisfying enough for each group member was ten times easier than discovering the organizations ourselves. I don’t have a solid reason why I did not visit many other support centers here at Baruch but I have time within my 7 other future semesters to take a look.

One thing I got started on as soon as I could was joining the student club, Lexicon. I found that this yearbook club would offer me a way to stay social, try new creative things, and still have something serious to complete. I went out of my comfort zone and chose the photography section of this club, and I’m glad I did! In addition I also joined the Honors Council. With this, I’m helping to plan the Honors winter ball. Not only does these two clubs offer me a quick escape from educational stress, it also teaches me how to further manage my time which, honestly, is beneficial to every freshman. Sadly, neither of these clubs helped with my community service project, but hopefully these clubs are the stepping stones for something greater.

Baruch a great school with many support and stepping stones to help a student look well. Hopefully three years from now, I’ll be president of one of the clubs I’m in now or president of another club. I also hope I’m more involved with Baruch and ready to move on from this chapter!

As a freshman, it can be difficult to learn about everything that your new college has to offer to you. However, since my first day at Baruch, my knowledge of the school has grown to the point that I have learned just how easily I can utilize everything that the school has to offer to me. Most especially, it was through all of the workshops from Freshman Orientation that I learned about everything around me. The center that I have taken advantage of the most so far has been the library. I have used a lot of my free time between classes to go to the library and use the studious environment that it offers in order to get a lot of my work done. In addition to the library, I have also spent my time with a club that has also helped me through my first semester: the Golden Key Buddies Program. Through the workshops they organized, I learned how to truly be successful and take advantage of everything around me during my time at Baruch. I plan on advancing myself into the club next semester and hopefully even gaining a leadership position in the upcoming years. All of the resources that I have been exposed to have helped me get through this fun, yet obstacle filled, first semester. The community service project that we were assigned first appeared to be any other task that I had to complete during my first year of college. However, as the Fall semester comes to an end, I no longer view it as just a project. Instead, it is the opportunity for me to get started on something that is much larger than myself: a life of service. I believe that by partaking in volunteering so soon, it will be a stepping stone toward my future endeavours in giving back to the community that has given me so much. Throughout my next four years at Baruch, I wish to accomplish all of the goals that I have set for myself. However, this is the simplest vision that I have of myself. I hope that with every passing day, I will learn to use all of the resources that I have around me in order to become my best possible self. I have always been one to strive for greatness and I believe that Baruch will guide me throughout this journey. Waking up everyday knowing that I will be immersing myself within the world’s greatest city is something that people from all around the world dream of and as a result, I plan to always make the most out of this amazing opportunity.

Successful college students take the initiative to seek out resources they need including faculty, peers, staff, support centers, the library, and student clubs among others. How has your participation in the Community Service Project encouraged you to draw upon the expertise of faculty and staff? Which support centers have you utilized? Have you joined a student club? Describe how using these resources for your team project have given you an edge in your other courses and your future success at Baruch. How has your understanding of community service evolved as a result of your participation in the project? Where do you see yourself in the next 3 years?

When we first start college and even before as we prepare to go to college one of the first things, besides maintaining a good grade, people constantly suggest you to do is to get involved in as many clubs that you are able to be apart of. They always tell you that are how school becomes more enjoyable and how you meet new people. This community service project made all of what they were saying seem to be 100% accurate. By working with an organization not only are we getting to work with others that we might pass on the street on a daily basis but also it is getting us involved with things that sometimes may be flaws in our city. It has made me want to find out about more ways which I could become more involved on the campus whether it be through a club that they know about or ones that they know of to be popular. This community service project makes me want to get more involved in my school to see what can I do here to bring more enjoyment to school just as doing something in the city makes the city more appealing. By joining different clubs at Baruch whether it may be more of a social club or an academically based club, I have been exposed to more people and different activities on campus. In doing so it made coming to school despite it still being school slightly more tolerable. I am still in the process of looking for new clubs and hearing about clubs that my friends are in, but from the ones I am in now it give me something to look forward to during our 4 hour break.

By learning the effect and the importance of being involved in different activities from this community service project it makes me want to make sure that I leave time in my space to try new clubs or activities throughout my college years. The lessons I learned have showed me a part of myself that I know I need to work on and I want to continue to push those boundaries to be the best person that I could be. As a result it made me realize there was much more to this community service project than a simple requirement I can not only grow as a person, but I can become more involved in my city. There is no better way to discover the city than by doing different projects organized by New York Cares and being able to put a smile on someone’s face. Right now I am very clueless and unappreciative of the city I have lived in all my life and I hope as these four years go by, coming to Manhattan feels more than just a burden.

Not much has changed from the beginning of the semester to the present. I can count the things that have changed on my fingers. Probably the most interesting thing that happened to me this semester is that I joined Golden Key as a golden buddy. I consider the day I started going to Golden Key workshops a pivotal point in the semester.

Before Golden Key, I was jumping around from club-to-club – not dedicated to any. I couldn’t find anything I really liked; no one club had the spunk or the vibe I was looking for. If nothing worked out, I was considering on starting my own club – of course – this would not be a simple process. I went from Bengali Student Union to Korean Student Association to The Grid to Marketers of Baruch. Finally, I found Golden Key and decided to stay.

The thing I liked about GK was that it provided me with a community that helped each other and supported each other. It was a community of the top 15% people in the grade; how could I not like them? It was quite obvious how those people in the community were not just book smart, but also had great social skills. It is a small, but warm community.

When I had questions, I either asked my peers or the people in Golden Key. It made sense; they were all juniors or seniors who went through the same things I am going through now. I even had a mentor in GK; I was a golden buddy and my mentor, Jason Tong was a golden mentor. I asked him a bunch of questions and he gladly took the time to answer them.

GK didn’t really help me with anything concerning my academics, but mostly influenced my professional life. I was happy to extract any sort of information from the people of GK. All of the people had unique experiences that are vastly different from mine.

In short, if utilized smartly, the GK community can help any freshman assimilate into the Baruch atmosphere.

To summarize my experiences at Baruch so far, I’d say what I’ve heard from the faculty members and upper peers alike: “Baruch is truly what you make of it”. On topic of our volunteering project, it was mostly an inclusive effort between me and my members. It didn’t drive us to explore Baruch the way that Mr. Medina had hoped it would. What drove me to explore Baruch was my desire to make the best out of my experience here at this college. I wanted to have an actual job since I didn’t have the opportunity to do so during my high school career. This drove me to go around to different departments and facilities around Baruch. I went to the library, the Weismann center, the international student center, the gym and many more. I never even knew we had a swimming pool before and I love swimming. I didn’t come to college just to study and find a job however. I wanted to expand my horizons and create new friendships and relationships also. Ever since the freshman convocation day, I’ve been interested in joining clubs. I signed up for many clubs. I visited many clubs. I’ve settled down at the Vietnamese Student Association at the moment. I intend to expand my horizons and join other clubs starting next semester. I’d say joining a fun and engaging club such as VSA contributes to most of my social life in Baruch. Thanks to Baruch, I’ve made plenty of new friends within and outside of the school. My life at Baruch so far is really what I’ve made of it. I intend to continue to make the most out of it for the next few years of my stay here.

In order to pick our community service project, we asked peers what they are doing. From the information they gave us we saw what we would like to do. For example, if we would want to work with children, homeless, or sick people. They gave us ideas and we narrowed it down to what we decided, which was to help homeless people suffering with AIDs and HIV. I have yet to go to any support centers but I am sure I will go to them very soon. I have joined Hillel, which is a Jewish cultural club. So by allowing these resources such as factually, peers, and staff to help with choosing our organization. It opened the conversation to us, allowing us to ask our peers about future courses we will take. I asked my older peer what they think about CIS and they said they loved it, which persuaded me to go ahead and enroll in that class. I also now ask faculty questions regarding my work and therefore, I am more accurate in getting the work done similarly to how they thought the assignment should be done. My understanding for community service evolved as a result in understanding this project. Now, I see why it is so important to help people in need. I volunteered before but that was just with a camp for the summer as a counselor and office worker. But now I see other opportunities that I have. Like volunteering my time, in order to help those who are sick and can’t help themselves. In the next three years I see myself working in a Financial Company and I see my self volunteering on my time off. Since I acquired so much knowledge on why volunteering is important and necessary I will still try my best to help those in need. I am also debating whether I want to get my Masters in finance, but I still haven’t decided yet.

Transitioning from high school to college can definitely be a big change. I got accustomed to the teaching styles that my high school had by the time I came to Baruch. When I started my classes, I realized that you may not always learn everything in class and that you must take an initiative to learn the material, regardless if it is taught in class. I wanted to maintain an A in my Applied Calculus course, but as the material began to get harder and the professor would skip over lectures in order to finish the course in time for the final, that caused me a lot of stress. I was accustomed to always do well in math classes, as it was something I enjoyed, but this situation made me feel as if I wasn’t so great at math anymore and that was an upsetting feeling. After finding out from my professor that tutoring at Baruch is free and available to everyone, I went to SACC. I started off by signing up for weekly reviews to make sure I understood the material well, but as time went on and more material was skipped, I began to sign up for private tutoring. It was an amazing experience and I’m so happy that it is available for everyone. The day after my tutoring session we had a quiz in class and I was ecstatic to find out that what I learned in tutoring was never mentioned in class and it just so happened to be on the quiz. I am definitely going to attend more tutoring sessions throughout my years here at Baruch, because even if I understand the material, just being able to practice it and get some pointers is something that I appreciate.

I am also very grateful to have the Bowery Mission as my Community Service Project. I love working with people and helping the community grow, so I am really happy that we found out about other students’ volunteer experience there. I look forward to volunteering and gaining new experience there in my following semester. I have always loved helping those in need as I have done lots of volunteering before. Whether it be handing out supplies to the areas affected by Hurricane Sandy or even volunteering at the New York City Fire Museum, I believe that one small act of kindness can go a long way.

In the next three years, I hope to gain a lot of new experiences. My time at Baruch thus far has shown me that the world has an abundance of things that I have not yet discovered. I hope that by then I will have found my place in the world and grown as a person.

As I reminisce about my very first semester here at Baruch, it is very hard to believe that it is almost over. In just a few months, I have met an array of interesting people and I have also done an array of interesting activities (not only here at Baruch, but throughout the city). However, I would not have been able to be in this position if it weren’t for Baruch’s many faculty members, peers, staff, support centers, the library, and student clubs. Each of these things has played some type of role in my college experience so far, and I couldn’t be more grateful. More specifically, the use of Baruch’s Starr Career Development Center has been monumentally helpful for me. Coming into a school like Baruch was definitely a huge transition from high school and I felt very overwhelmed. I had a notion that I wanted to pursue a career in the Business field, but I didn’t know exactly what I wanted to do with this degree. I talked to some of my peers about my dilemma and they suggested that I apply to internships that would help me get a better idea of what I was interested in. This was a very great idea, but in order to apply to internships, I had to develop my resume. That was when I was introduced to Baruch’s Starr Career Development Center. I decided that I could really use some of their help to develop my resume, so I attended one of their walk-in sessions. Once I went, I met with one of their workers who was incredibly nice and supportive and she helped improve my resume in depth. Ever since, I have applied to several 2017 summer internships using the improved resume and I really do have a good feeling about them. I have also attended one of Starr Center’s workshops titled “No Major, No Problem” in which they introduced me to a program called Focus 2. This program asks you several questions about your personal interests and goals, and it gives you numerous career options that would best suit you. Focus 2 turned out to be very useful to me because it has given me a better idea about the types of jobs that are out there and the types of jobs that are best for me. I have nothing but positive things to say about Baruch’s Starr Career Development Center because of their usefulness. I believe that this resource has given me an edge in my future success at Baruch, because once I figure out what I really want to do in life, I’ll be able to find a major and pursue that career faster than if I didn’t have access to this type of help. In the next 3 years I see myself working very hard at the goals I set for myself (whether it be getting into graduate school or landing a job) and not being afraid to ask for some help.

To be a successful college student is to take advantage of every opportunity you have the chance to. My participation in the Community Service Project has encouraged me to draw upon the expertise of faculty and staff specifically with Tamara’s help with all of the Baruch Scholars in the process of our projects. I’ve learned the importance of asking question in order to assure I’m proceeding with my progress correctly. I look forward to the community service project as our organization, New York Cares, has so many options that we are bound to find volunteer opportunities that suit our interests and in turn make us grow as people while helping other simultaneously. Baruch has many clubs during club hours, but my biggest issue was finding a club to fit my interests. So far I have joined NYMIA (the New York Music Industry Association) and I have interviewed for TEAM Baruch. NYMIA has already improved my college experience, allowing me opportunities to network with other musicians, meet music professionals at panels, and indirectly allowed me to join Grammy U in which I attended a sound check for Troye Sivan for free. Three years from now, I see myself as a senior at Baruch preparing for my last semester of college. As my intended major is Management of Musical Enterprises, I see myself with an extensive knowledge of music compared to what I have currently. I will be continuing my music internship that was mandatory during my junior year and hopefully will have formed a band and/or joined a music group to play with on a regular basis. I see myself changing for the better as I see myself already beginning to do in the beginning of college, whether it be socially as becoming more friendly as I have or academically as I have started learning how to study properly, specifically for psychology. I look forward to seeing who I become in my years at Baruch.