FRO13 LC06

For most of the time during the enrichment workshop, I was busy studying for the history test, so I didn’t get a chance to listen to everything the man was talking about. Since a majority of the time consisted of re-watching the video that we were assigned to see before the man’s presentation, I didn’t pay much attention. After the video was finished, there was a question and answer session for about fifteen minutes or less… Well, that’s how long it felt like….

After the video, the man invited some students in the audience to ask any questions or to make a comment about anything they wanted to say, either based on the video or based on the actual volunteer work that we did for NYCares. I only paid attention to part of the information session since I was studying, but I got the general idea that a student was commenting on how he started volunteering and after, he continued to go to that place.

It sort of related to my situation because when I heard about the required volunteering work, I thought that I wouldn’t have enough time to do it because of the amount of homework that was adding up. After I actually went to the soup kitchen to help serve food for the homeless, I realized that doing something beneficiary for the poor and homeless made me feel better inside. The fact that I contributed to help the homeless survive longer on the “home-cooked” meals made me feel that I could actually accomplish something for a larger group of people through volunteering. Maybe it’s due to the fact that I went with a small group of friends that made it fun and interesting than if I went alone, but it was fun nonetheless and I would like to continue volunteering there if I have time in the future after I’m done with homework and everything else that comes with college….

This is pretty much how I feel about college…

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I chose this meme because I thought that it pretty much summed up everything about my first semester at Baruch. I feel that every year before school starts, I’m always bored with nothing to do and I sort of wish that school would come faster so that I could see my friends again…

Once I actually start school, I feel a bit excited and anxious for what the classes and teachers are like. As I progress throughout the school year, I start changing from energetic to bored and depleted. Even though it’s only been a few months since school started, I feel like it’s been a year already compared to how high school life was like… College does take a lot of energy, time, effort, and work.

I feel like I was lied to when some people came back from college during my senior year and they were like “College is awesome.” To me, college is fun with friends by your side and a few great teachers, but other than that, some other teachers and the homework assigned adds up and conquers over the “fun” that I have in college. I feel that if I were to go back to high school and inform others about college experience, I’d tell them the truth – that college is a lot of work and you have to be dedicated to be caught up with everything that’s going on.

It is true that you can only choose sleep and social life, sleep and good grades, or good grades and social life because I can’t find myself having time to do all three of those things. I try to study hard and to review everything before quizzes and tests, but I always seem to do average in tough classes like math… Other than math, I feel like the other classes are fairly okay (grades wise). Sometimes, during club hours, I’d have to sacrifice time to join clubs for study time for quizzes and tests that seem to pop up every single week. At home, I try to get enough sleep, but I always seem to be the last one awake doing homework until after midnight…

In the blink of an eye, the end of the first semester has begun to come to an end. I have begun to navigate my way across the halls with ease. I know all of my teachers by name, and I even have begun to familiarize myself with the many different entertainment institutions of the school. When I was told to select a meme that best described by college experience, I immediately thought of my math class. Not only is it my hardest class, and one where I do the most studying, but it is also unfortunately my worst class. I am currently around a B- average, which is in stark contrast to my As in the other classes. Although I have already taken Calculus in my previous year, I find myself staring blankly at the whiteboard in Professor Reich’s class, hoping for a miracle to hit me and help me understand the hieroglyphic scribbles that I am expected to decipher. I am not alone in this conquest. My fellow classmates, also many of which have taken calculus before, find themselves struggling to stay afloat in our math class. I always believed that I was good at math. This narcissism some may call it, was greatly weakened upon my entering into high school, however I still managed to retain most of my confidence in the field. In the short 3 months that I have spent with Professor Reich, I have found that original cockiness to diminish into incoherent babble. Every time i see “x”, I die a little bit on the inside. Some may even say I have now become a math-phobe. Any joy I had previously had for the subject has very well been run into the ground and trampled on. I am not a math major, and I rejoice at the fact that I will never again in my college life have to put myself through the torture of a math class in this school. furthermore, I have been informed by multiple upperclassmen that the whole math department is known for its sub-par professors. this makes me cry on the inside for all those that wish to pursue mathematics in Baruch College. Perhaps I am overstating the apparent lack of professionalism in the math department in this school, and maybe I am not trying hard enough. I do agree with the fact that the teacher is responsible to only a certain extent, and that the majority of responsibility for learning and studying the subject matter lies with the student. However with that being said I do believe myself to be doing my part. Despite my efforts however I still find myself in the dark. I no longer learn math in school. Instead I have found academic solace in YouTube videos, specifically Khan Academy, which has been my best friend for my last test and 3 quizzes. Looking forward, I only have 3 more weeks left of math, however in those few weeks lies a test, several quizzes, and dozens of painful class hours. The math struggle in this school is real.

The kids in Baruch just put in so much time into their work and its so mind-numbing how much time they put into their work. In a way, its a really good environment to be in but in another way, its really competitive as well. I do not know if I am able to hold up a good grade and I am constantly thriving to do better. This comes from not only helping my classmates, but also from helping myself. This process of explaining to my classmates what happened and what we learned does not only help them, but really helps me a lot in making sure I remember everything. They have so much information as well and this makes sure that I learn new things every time I review with them. The core of their education is so strong and I am so proud to be around a group of people like this.

I remember my first recollection of taking a class in Baruch was my math class in calculus. The first class had to do with limits and it was just so difficult to grasp the concepts that the professor was trying to teach. It was something I have encountered before, but never really got the hang of how to do with. With the assistance of other students that took the calculus course before, I was able to better understand limits and even pull off a good score on my test. Furthermore, they put in the time into their work so they are smart, but it is respectable that they put time into their work.

Aside from classroom environment and having a good experience with my classmates, I also like the library environment that Baruch provides. The library opens up to eleven o’clock sometimes and I am currently writing my blog here in this library. This quiet environment allows me to do work that I probably would not have gotten done if I was at home and gives me the opportunity to work in an environment promoting educational growth. I love how the schools is set up so that people are in a comfortable spot to work and they have the chance to lay back in their seat and enjoy the things that they are learning about. To me, an environment like this is essential to producing intelligent workers that will enter the work force with knowledge and reasoning skills.

Overall, I am very happy about my first semester in Baruch. From classmates to study environments set up by Baruch, I feel very comfortable with where I am at. This college not only provides an environment to study and learn, but more importantly, an environment that promotes future success and gives us good networks for the best possible development we can have.

Picture by Erastez (link: http://s231.photobucket.com/user/Erastez/media/Omerta%20Mixed/Sleepy.gif.html)

The first three month at Baruch College felt intimidating especially with picking your courses for the spring semester. However, the academic advisor breaks down the required core, flexible core and major requirement pretty well. After the midterm, I never seem to get enough sleep. Now with finals approaching, the hours to rest seem to get shorter and shorter. This fall semester was interesting… As for the enrichment workshop, I find it is true that one can find happiness during volunteering or simply helping another person out. I thinks its that feeling of making a difference(even if its a small one) that brighten our day. It’s no wonder why people fell in love in helping other people out and set their life career in the non-profit field. I personally felt great after participating in one of the project for New York Care. Even thou it was literally making origami all day, I know the people that receive it know that there is someone out there that cares about them. Plus, i get to learn how to make origami which is a very immersive activity.  I am going to take a nap now. Happy Thanksgiving!  P.S. I’M THE FIRST TO POST! I THINK…  -Raymond Huang

My experience with the NY Times project was a pleasant one. My group and I chose our topic to Sports. We saw sports as a topic that most people could relate to in one way or another. In addition, we saw it as a unique topic, and we were right, since no one else chose it. We did research on several levels of sports involving our local, national, and global interests in sports. We also attended a sports game which proved to be a great social and interactive experience. In addition, I felt myself form a bond not only with my group members, but with the members as my school as well. Cheering for the same team tends to do that to people.

Moreover, I am part of the swim team, which stands to be the reason that I have such a personal passion for sports. Although I never found myself interested with watching the American pastime sports, swimming has shown me my physical potential, as well as my mental endurance. I have been swimming for 5 years now, and it has led me to physical health, as well as summer occupation as a lifeguard. I plan on pursuing swimming as my passion for many years to come. Needless to say I had a special bond with the project, which was a delight to do.

Our NewYorkTimes post theme was Travel and Explorations. Through reading articles about our theme on the NYTimes, I found out many interesting places I would actually want to visit when I’m traveling next time and food that I want to try out.One of the place I want to visit is in Pennsylvania, one of the article I read and summarized about. They have this famous street which contains many artsy coffeehouses, boutiques, salons, bars and many interesting and sophisticated designed stores. I also found the haunted house article very interesting, for those who are into adventures like me would be fascinated about reading this article and want to definitely visit this place. Through working on this project, I learned the importance of traveling and exploring new kinds of food. Today, everyone is so stressed out about their works, schools, relationships and many other factors. People should take time off from this daily routines that cause so much stress, and travel many places and explore many different kinds of food in order to release the stress and find out things that they never knew about before. Also through this project, I found out the importance of being involved in a club because they make you feel belong to the school more and help you with your careers.

Grupo Tres did its front page on movies. Movies are a great way to enjoy a few hours and many good movies are coming soon. We decided to do this to show our block about what kinds of movies are out there to watch. However, when we began, we just wanted to put reviews about movies but then it turned out to be better than that including a article about popcorn and even one about an actor. Even though we had a movie theme, our bearcat post was nothing related to movies. We talked about something completely different. These affect us because the bearcat posts can help all of us make decisions to get more into whatever we want to do.

https://blogs.baruch.cuny.edu/lc06highnotes/

The New York Times project was definitely a very interesting project to have. Our group, the high notes, could only agree on one common interest and that was music. That is also the reason why we are called the high notes. The group figured that since everyone’s life is somehow shaped by the music they listen to, we would have a lot to present and that people would be very interested in the articles that we would have for the audience. We decided to explore mostly classical music such as Yo-Yo Ma, who is world famous for his cello playing. Also, we wanted to explore the effects of classical music and achievement. After reading the article about music and achievement, we found that music opens the door for creative thinking that might not have been triggered without music.

Aside from our major theme of music, my fellow group member and I decided to write our New York Times article about the social fraternities of Baruch College, specifically Lambda Phi Epsilon. This group is based on the Asian culture and is a social fraternity where the guys in the fraternity will meet many new people. Not everyone could join though because the fraternity was very selective. Overall, going to the general events was a really great experience for me because I got some kind of feeling as to what fraternity life would be like. I got to know some of the brothers in the fraternity and how they felt about the whole idea of brotherhood. This experience of the New York Times project was a good one.

Our group, Grupo Tres, did our New York Times assignment on the topic of movies. Not that its so important to our first semester as college student, but movies are a great way to spend leisure time to relax from all the school work the professors give us. Movie theaters are very common in today’s society and can be spotted almost anywhere you go. We decided to use our time looking for articles about movies mostly because it’s simply an interesting thing to talk about. With many movies coming soon, and already out, people can enjoy a few hours resting their bodies from moving pencils or constant research.

Our bearcat article was nowhere near relevant to our topic. But it was still interesting to have a glimpse of an idea about. It just opened our eyes to the real world. Getting a few advices and experience stories can be helpful in knowing what you want to do after college. Speeches from real working businessmen are great opportunities to know more about a company as described in our bearcat article.

Mostly our movie articles were review made by movie reviewers. They describe a sneak peak to a film soon to appear, or explain in bits of detail the actual film already in many theaters. Some of these movies are “Linsanity” as well as the remake of the common film “Romeo and Juliet.” Other articles we chose explain actual facts about movie theaters. One article explains movie prices changing over a period of time. The other explains how and when popcorn became a must eat snack while watching a film.

Overall this assignment was interesting in a way since we had to search for several articles from a source that relate to one topic.

https://blogs.baruch.cuny.edu/lc06highnotes/

My group decided to employ music as our topic for the front page project because music is our common interest. Music is the only topic that everyone agrees in my group. I think  music is a very fun and interesting topic because it can serve as a tool for communication between different groups of people. People have different dialects beside their common official language even though they are in the same geographical area . At this situation, music can help people  express their thoughts, and communicate with others without using spoken or written languages.

I think selections about music best express the most salient issues during my first semester at Baruch, because Baruch College is a very diverse community. Students at Baruch are from different background, different cultures and different geographical areas all over the world. Sometimes, it is difficult for students that have different languages and different cultures to unite together as a group. However, music can fill the gap between differences. Music can bring students unite together and consider themselves as members of the large community.