DTF

Baruch College has been a lot more than I ever thought or dreamed of. I was tired of the slow pace living in high school, seeing the same faces every day, waking up and going to bed at the same time every day for 10 months out of the year. I was glad to find myself in the city, yeah my routine isn’t as predictable as I thought it would be, something happens everyday, good or bad, so it keeps me on my toes. Baruch definitely broke down my ego though, in high school, I never study and still got good grades. For the first time, I’ve had to study and I’m still getting the hang of it, but its made me realize I’m not as smart as I thought it was, and even if I was, I’d still need to study to do as well as I aim to. What didn’t live out to my expectation was the arts, I didn’t find a club to join cause there wasn’t anything that interested me, everything was divided out by race, job opportunities, learning life skills, or a general interest like music. I was also disappointed when I realized how uncreative the people in the school are, I guess that comes with being a business school but it still was a shock. The professors were beyond my expectations. Everyone made colleges to be strict, grumpy and hard to relate to, they were wrong. I think that I did good, I wasn’t as focused as I should have been, but I think I needed time to get adjusted and figure stuff out on my own. However, I doubt that I will get anything less than a B- in my classes, and that encourages me that I can do EVEN better next semester if I just apply myself more, work on study habits, and learn from the mistakes I made this semester. I wouldn’t do anything differently. I believe happens for a reason, and I learned something new everyday. I also think I grew as a people, mostly for the better, and I am more driven now than I was before. Not to mention, I meet some great people and go to try new things. My FRO was amazing, the instructor and peer mentor included and it going to be weird next semester on Tuesdays without it. Overall, I am more certain of myself, and I know what I need to work on to become a better all around person and student, and I’m happy that I chose to go to Baruch.

So far the first semester at Baruch was one of the most productive and memorable experience i didnt expect to have. i met amazing friends and join a fraternity and at the same time i had the best freshmen seminar teacher. My classes were also very engaging and interesting i didnt expect this from a business school i thought everyone would be serious and be in suits but i was wrong and im so glad i was wrong. if i could retake my first semester i wouldn’t do anything differently because i don’t want to change the experience i already had. And at my first semester at Baruch i felt that i changed my view of Baruch and of art because my art history class led to the decision of taking art as a minor

I could not have been more happy with my College choice Baruch. This college definitely was one that lived up to my expectation. In my opinion Baruch is located in one of the best areas in the city. That being said there is definitely a great mix of work and fun. The teachers that I had my first semester were great and connected very well with the students, making it an easy transition into the college world from high school.  If there were to be a problem, the teachers were always there to help and make a great working environment to the students. My first semester went by great, I managed to keep my grades up high and tried to finish up strong  because I heard , later on it gets much more difficult. I don’t think i would have done anything differently if I were to go back because from the beginning   I tried not to mess up and hopefully by the end of the semester my hard work would have payed off. I really don’t think i have changed a great deal since the start of school, other then my maturity. I believe I became a much more responsible adult and finally begun to take my work seriously and effectively.

I can’t believe I am practically done with my first semester at Baruch College!  It is so surreal to think that I am half way through my freshman year of college.  In the beginning of the semester I was scared and didn’t know whether or not I would make many friends.  I also was uneasy about having the same people in a lot of my classes.  I was afraid I would be too quiet and not outgoing enough.  Luckily for me, it was easy to meet people and the people I have met in my block have been amazing.  I never expected to form such good relationships, especially at a predominately commuter school!  It will be bittersweet as this semester ends, but I know that I have made friendships that will last.  Even though I would like to say I’ve had no regrets looking back, but unfortunately I do.  Academically I feel as if i could’ve taken my work more seriously.  Although at times I felt overwhelmed with my new environment I sometimes became lax and procrastinated certain assignments.  I wish I would’ve been more diligent with homework, because now I am struggling to make some of them up.  Next semester I will try to procrastinate less and stay on top of my work.  Especially because next semester my softball season starts and time management will be crucial.  I’m proud of myself though.  Even though I started of shaky i feel as if I am finishing this semester strongly and hope to carry it over to my second semester.  As a whole, I can look back on my first semester at Baruch and feel content.  New experiences can be hard to adjust to but they are also what made my first semester of college so excited.  Based on how fast this first semester has went, I have learned that I must enjoy and take advantage of everyday I have in college.

The fall 2011  semester of  Baruch  is coming to an end very shortly. It was a great experience all around. There were some ups and downs throughout but overall it was great. It was pretty much what I expected of a college coming in. In some ways it was hard but not too bad. Finals are coming up and then a long vacation. I feel like i did pretty well overall but there is still room for improvement.  I don’t think i would’ve done anything different if i has to do the whole semester over again.I think everything went pretty smoothly and I enjoyed the experience very much. I think I changed in ways that I cant tell. I don’t feel like I changed at all but everyone changed in their first semester of college.

Well, I originally didn’t want to go to Baruch, mainly because I thought I wouldn’t get the “full college experience”, because I wasn’t dorming. But then, I realized that going to Baruch made sense, because I want to do something in the business field, and this is one of the best schools for that. Baruch has been okay, and I’m liking the fact that there’s so many people, you rarely see the same people twice. I hate the commute, because it takes me an hour and 20 minutes. Other than that, Baruch has been a good school.

I hope I do well on my finals. I think I did okay in my classes, but it was tough to get myself to study. Once I work on that, I think I’ll do better in school. If I could do it all again, I would stay for tutoring, and study a LOT more. I would have joined more clubs and been more active in the student life, if I could change anything about my first semester in Baruch.

Since college started, I’ve been more independent, and I know what I want. I think I’ve learned to be a better  student and take my education seriously.

For the past 5 years my family has gone to St. Maarten too spend winter break in beautiful and comforting weather.  Every year was better than the last and we were more and more eager to attend every year. This year however, I witnessed something very tragic happen right before my eyes, something that would change my life forever. St. Maarten has an amazing night life, since all the youngsters come together and party hard. That being said, my group of friends and I decided to meet up by the lobby of the hotel and head to a club named Mansion. Mansion is located six restaurants away from our hotel so we decided to take a walk.  As we were walking, we notice two beautiful girls on the other side of the street, since they were cute and were also fairly young we started to scream out different things hoping, they would come with us. However they ended up walking by and telling us to come with them towards a bar named Soggy Dollar. We then continued along to Mansion, but then we came to a screeching halt when we heard a car hit something. Glancing over my friend Tyler says “the car hit a garbage can it’s fine”, we then continued along, three seconds later my other friend, Amy, Screams “THE GIRLS!”  The whole crowd runs to the scene to notice 2 beautiful girls lying on the floor covered in blood. We later learned that one of the girls passed away and the other one was carried away and placed in the intensive care unit. What this tragic accident taught me was to appreciate what life has to offer. No one knows when their day will come to pass away, so live life to the fullest and enjoy every waking moment because life is great.

Joshua Banilivy

Freshman Seminar

Monologue

It was on one Friday night when I started to appreciate my life more then I ever did. As you all know I am an EMT. On that Friday night we get an ambulance call of a cardiac arrest. I saw the address our dispatcher told us to head too, and I realized that it was one of my close friends house. I get up and leave Shabbat dinner and head over there, and as I walk into the house I see my friends dad lying on the floor due to a cardiac arrest. I said to myself we can’t let him die, so we started performing CPR on him, but nothing was working. We got to the hospital and they couldn’t due anything to save him. My friend’s dad died at the age 43 due to a stupid fucking aneurism. When I saw my friend’s reaction to his father’s death, it made me realize that I need to appreciate my parents more, not just my parents but my life as well. My friend’s life was changed instantly after his father’s death, and what I realized is that it could’ve been my father. I learnt that I need to appreciate my life more. I used to take my life for granted, but after that experience I realized that life is too short, and you have to live it to the fullest, and always live everyday as if its your last.  And always be happy, happiness is key to life.

When I was in 8^th grade I was this chubby kid who just struck puberty, and like all the boys my age I had one thing on my mind, girls. In my school there was this girl Katie. She was popular, very cute, going out with a senior, and most importantly a year older, which basically meant I had no chance. But you always want what you cant have and I was no exception, I wanted her. I went through my 8^th grade crushing on her, and she had no clue I existed. The summer before high school I started working out, lost a lot of weight, and came into 9^th grade a new man. High school was a new start for me, I was excited, and I did not forget about Katie. Slowly I started talking with the upper class and Katie as well, this was already a big step for me. Eventually I did what none of my friends thought I could do. Get with an older girl.  It was a glorious time, my first girlfriend was older and popular, and this in turn made me more popular. Every girl in high school was thinking about me, and everyone wanted to be my friend. But I was trying so hard to keep my relationship that I started acting too nice to Katie, honestly I had no other clue on how to act in a relationship. After we broke up I started to analyze myself, Katie, and what went on during the time her and me went out. I figured girls don’t want nice they get that on a day to day basis and its unordinary, so I started to act like a jerk, and it worked. At the time I was never more surprised in my life.  This was my first relationship, and it helped me learn a lot about how people work and how to work with people that I could’ve never learned on my own. This was all what seems to be a long time ago, and my opinion on relationships has changed and matured drastically since then, but nonetheless I would never be where I am today without this experience.

me, my dad, and my two brothers were set for a two day trip to Islamorada, a tarpon spot roughly 2 hours south of miami. so we started heading out to the islamorada flats, about a half hour drive. we got to the spot and set the baits, and now it was just a waiting game. after an hour of waiting  one of the lines went off and my older brother grabbed the rod. after about ten minutes of fighting we knew it wasnt a tarpon. we got the fish next to the boat, but it wasnt a fish, it was a nice size nurse shark, cool, but still not what we were out there for. so we reset the lines and continued the waiting game. it was 7:50 pm and getting dark. we had ten minutes left until our time was up, and my hopes for the fish of a life time were shrinking. but suddenly one of the reels started spinning out of control and before we cud even grab the rod from the holder, we saw what was the giant on the line jump over a 100 yards from our tiny boat. I stood on the bow of the tiny boat as we chased the monster around and fought like there was no tomorrow. it got to the point where it was pitch black and we had to use a flashlight as our only way to avoid complete darkness. after about a half hour of fighting, the fish surfaced for an instant and we shined our light on it. this wasnt just any tarpon, it was a massive one. the captain estimated atleast 6 feet in length and 150 pounds. after that brief moment the fish returned below the surface and the fight kept going. it was getting close to an hour of fighting and my body was aching but i was determined to beat the fish.  out of nowhere i felt the line on my rod start surging towards the surface, we got the light ready, and suddenly it jumped completely out of the water right infront of us. it was an amazing sight. it jumped several times after that and then dove once again. i was fighting the fish for an hour now and it was either get it in now or head home. i finally got it to the boat with everything i had left and we released the fish successfully.