DTE: Surviving College 101

So I finished my community service at Brooklyn Chinese-American Association. I was assigned to an elementary school and tutored the kids for the after-school program. It wasn’t fun indeed because kids were annoying. I was taking care of a 4th grade classs and the kids really annoyed me. Perhaps I don’t look old enough and they were not scared. I realized that it’s pretty hard to be a teacher. A teacher has to be really careful of what they say and what they do to students, as kids usually tend to seek for superior  authority – their parents- when they think they are threatened. Then they will believe the teacher is going to be in a trouble. Through this community service, except for having more hostility towards kids, I pretty much learnt how they think and how I should communicate with them. For example when kids asked me about homework, I was used to explain in my own sense and knowledge, which is bad, because the kids could never understand. So I learnt how to put myself into their shoes and tried to explain based on their understandings and perhaps taught them in a funnier way. Some of the kid were very smart and they understood quickly, while some just didn’t. In this case I sometimes asked the smarter kids to try to explain the questions to them. I believe this will train those kids in some ways since they did not just know how to solve math questions but they also knew how to use their knowledge to help the others and be more considerate.  In general I think this community service was not bad, at least I figured out how to get along with kids.

i ve worked at daycares a lot. maybe its something about the kids, about how they’re like we were back in the day. maybe its something to do with how the next generation will be the future. kids dont realize it but they really have all the chances in the world.

i went to PS20 to do community service, a daycare i myself used to go to and work at. that being said it was a very normal experience for me except that i didnt recognize many of the kids anymore cuz its been a while and some of them graduated. i miss kids, somewhat looking forward to being a father but just not anytime soon. working with kids takes a lot of energy out of you, always get so caught up in it but afterwards i always get the weirdest feelings.

it was a lot of fun, didnt learn much new stuff cuz i ve done it before but it was fun. if it werent for this mandatory community service work i dont think i wouldve gone back, it was nice seeing the kids again but i feel like that was such a big part of my life that i m ready to move on to different things.

kids are like crazed cats and dogs. you get the energetic ones that just go nuts if you wave your hands in the air. then you get the quiet strange ones that kinda float around doing the silliest things. some of them are so cute you just wanna squish them between your fingers but some of them make me look back and wonder “was i like that o_o” and then i realzie i would have to say yes usually lol. done some crazy things as a kid and missed my chance to do a lot of other things, but cant be having regrets now. i stand by my childhood as what made me who i am today, i can only hope all the kids i see around nowadays can appreciate that same sentiment and enjoy their youth.

I always expected college to leave me inundated with work, but I’ve only been semi-drowning at most.  The transition left me pulling a few all-nighters and if I could do anything differently, I would go back and manage my time better.  Overall, I’m the same person with some newfound hatred for public transportation and people who walk too slow, but I’ve met so many people different from myself and that has changed my perspective.  I think my first semester went as planned—I have all of my grades where I want them to be, except calculus of course, but that’s a readily lost uphill battle. I always joke with my mom that I’ll end up transferring during sophomore year like she did, but so far I can see myself completing my degree at Baruch.  Only time will tell.

Perfection in a resume isn’t just for perfectionists, but rather anyone who cares about landing a job.  Employers only pay 30 seconds to each resume, if that, so you need to be able to grab their interest upon first glance and lure them in to read more.  They advised us to utilize “power verbs” to describe your responsibilities at past jobs.  They took all our questions and advised us how to tweak your resume based on different employment opportunities to show your employer that you are a proper fit.  I certainly underestimated the amount of time, energy, and attention needed to make your resume stand out from the others.  I feel as if I can produce my resume effectively, but I can use resume review offered by STARR to help identify any mistakes made.

For my community service, I volunteered at the Christmas fair at my old grammar school.  My mom acted as the photographer for “Pictures with Santa” and I was her oversized elf. Seeing my old teachers and just being in the place I spent a significant part of my childhood makes me simply nostalgic.  I can relate to the 8^th graders, thinking how every day is their last, but I still think that’s me.  I have to say though, it’s so weird going back to grammar school and seeing things through a larger perspective.  The bench outside the office was the last place you would want to be—I’m still amazed at how scared I was of the mere threat of being sent to the principal’s office.  All of that seems insignificant compared to the fact that instead of going to the principal’s office you can be arrested, but I digress.

I can’t really say my service was absolutely essential to the community, sure I helped make some little kid’s day, but it’s not like other community service I have done with organizations like Special Olympics.  But who knows what that kid is going through at home, just seeing their faces light up as they either ran chanting, “Santa, Santa, Santa!” or slowly walked toward him like he holds the fate of the world in his hands was something immeasurable.  I definitely would continue to do this in the coming years like I have in the past, it’s impossible not to.

For my community service, since I procrastinated till the very end, was working at my local library. A few years back I was part of this program with the library that allowed people my age to help patrons of the library with any computer problems they might have. So I went to the library by my house and asked if I could help them out for a few hours. So I go and sit down at the main computer, sign in, and make sure no one had any problems with their computer and that everyone did not exceed the thirty minute time limit that everyone gets. It was quite a slow day so nothing really big happened. Although one guy did have a little trouble with the printer. But it wasn’t a big problem and was easily solved. Anyway after 2-3 hours (not quite sure how long, it honestly felt like 5) I realized I wasn’t needed and went home. I know its a very heart warming story but you know that’s how I roll. Ight peace bitches

Well now that I have completed a semester at baruch I can happily say I have made some awesome friends and I am lucky to be in the Dte groups. Everyone in our freshman seminar is special in their own way and it was a pleasure interacting with such awesome people and super funny people. I now look forward to going to college specially Thursdays because I go to shoot events on Thursdays.  I enjoy classes and the in between breaks. I have fun and even though I have a 8 hour gap between classes next semester I am sure it will pass by in a flash. Now at this time of the year everyone is probably thinking about their finals and I want to wish everyone the best of luck. Hope we all get a 4.0. When I joined baruch everyone said the only way to have fun at baruch is by joining clubs and I feel that is so true. After joining lexicon and and usg, I know that now I can go to their rooms anytime and laugh away my time. For those people who are feeling they want more fun to  their college life please go join a club you will not regret it. I hope the next semester will be as awesome as this one, if not more.

I gave blood at the blood drive at baruch. I like giving blood because my blood group is O so my blood can be used by almost all the other blood groups. You feel good knowing that you can save someone’s life. Also I just learned from Vincent, or as professor David Hohl calls him Mr. cho, that giving blood is good for your health. He said it purifies your blood and he told me your lucky O blood group is rare :P.

For my workshop 3 I went to the art social in the 22nd building. It was fun the photos were from taken by a photographer named Hilton. All the pictures were black and white and they were taken with film cameras, i dont remember the exact date but i am sure they were taken before 1990. One of the pictures was called door of color. O n the door someone had painted only whites allowed and there was a african american standing outside. I liked the pictures at it conveyed a contrasting story about racial discrimination. Overall the exhibition was a very well organized and an entertaining experiance

At this workshop I kind of assumed ahead of time 
that the workshop would be dull but it was interesting. 
We justified in between which Resume/Coverletter deemed 
best and why. The class got to ask questions about how 
certain situations require us to tweak our resumes.
 Also very important neccessary tips for us to make 
our resume shine out over the rest. Overall I was 
astonished about how many little things must be done 
to produce a correct resume. She told us this rule 
of thumb that a hiring manager won't spend more than 
a minute reviewing resumes and cover letters so we must 
keep it short and sweet.