Author Archives: mbachman

I went home this month to participate in the yearly community service my high school holds called Squan-A-thon. Its similar to the “thon” that Penn State does. Our school has the members collect a minimum of $300 each to participate then has one night where everyone stays up and on their feet for 12 straight hours, from 8pm to 8am. The night is filled with fun activities and food and we ultimately raised over $40,000 for pediatric cancer.

1) How did your community service work help the community? 
We raised $40,000 to go towards fighting pediatric cancer. The money is donated to local families that have children going through chemo. To help these children, ass the [participates go through a 12 hour night on their feet and raise a ton of money each.

2) How did it make you feel to give up your time and energy to others?

It felt great knowing that so many people would give up a night of sleep and sitting down to help out these kids. It is those children that need the most help and are going through so much suffering the least we could do is stay up for a night for them. Raising money was rewarding and seeing the families that received the money was truly heart-warming.

3) How has your community service experience change your thinking, attitudes, and actions towards others, yourself, the community, and community servuce work as a whole?

It has helped me see that not everyone lives perfect lives, and sometimes a great misfortunate happens to even the retest or most innocent people. Children shouldn’t have to go through the sufferings of cancer or chemotherapy and it felt amazing to help out in our own way, make it fun, and raise an extraordinary amount of money for these kids and their families.

My motto is “just keep smiling”. Sure, my motto got a little distorted once Dory started swimming, but I’ll stick with it. No matter how bad things get, you have to keep smiling, and you have to make sure that these things that are there to get you down, don’t. You have to always move on and always overcome the bad. IF you let every negative happening heavily affect your life, then everyone in this room would have a raincloud over their heads. So I try to bring the sun out. I evaporate that cloud and I’ll keep on smiling, and I don’t care what tries to stop me! Or we could always listen to the wise words of Dory when we are stuck in the middle of the ocean, but that’s a whole different story.

I’m sure being stuck in the ocean would be someone’s greatest fear, and those words might empower them enough to drive them to the shore. Thankfully though, my greatest fear isn’t the ocean. Or at least it shouldn’t be, I live right on the shore, so that would be just too ironic. My greatest fear would probably be being alone, and losing the ones I love. They go hand in hand, I guess. Losing the ones I love would leave me alone, and it would terrify me. Sure, the typical height, spiders, and occasionally the dark creep me out a little, but ultimately my family and my friends are the most important people to me, and a life without them wouldn’t be a life at all. I mean, who would be there to eat with? To laugh with? To love? It absolutely horrifies me.

Talking about what I like usually calms me down, and Baruch seems to be on my mind. What is it about Baruch that I like? Could it be the “amazing” display of enthusiasm from the freshman advisors? Or maybe the fabulously convenient bills constantly sent to my Baruch email that I don’t check, or how about how roomy and spacious and how easy it is to catch an elevator, or maybe the perfectly close and easy commute traveling 70 blocks from my dorm to my classes are… Overall, Baruch is great! Sure, I might have complained a little, but who doesn’t have something to complain about? I don’t care that the escalators are never working, or that I have to wait in line for ten minutes to print a one-page paper. I love it here. I honestly can’t imagine myself anywhere else but here. I’ve tried picturing myself on a typical campus, and I just can’t. It’s weird how that works out. It’s almost as if this is “fake college” and the typical campus is more real. Ironically enough, it’s Baruch that is the most real school out there. We’re in real life. We are in New York City. Everyone around us doesn’t stare at us as students, but as real life people. We’ve been tossed into the bustling city life, and nothing could stop me from staying. Ultimately Baruch is where I’m meant to be, and I’m going to make the most of it.

This is me (8), my sister(10), and my dog Zuzu (2), my current profile picture, i think this best personifies me:)

A) I am outgoing, friendly, personAble, funny, charismatic and a hard worker.
B) Concern 1: Not being able to keep up with school work
Concern 2: Making new friends that I can easily get along with.
Concern 3: Getting lost on my way to class!
C) Being in the city is a dramatic change from being in high school compared to being in school at Baruch
D) I will be able to manage work differently and more efficiently, make new friends, and learn my way around the city better than before.