d.lee19 – First-Year Seminar FMA

STARR Workshop

Recently, I attended a workshop that was hosted by STARR careers. It was called “Let’s Get Started: Building Blocks for First and Second Year Students.” At first I was a bit hesitant about going to this workshop because I felt that I had already knew enough about this school and about the resources that were available to me. However I decided to go anyways as it couldn’t hurt to find out more.

At first, I was a few minutes late so I was a little hesitant in walking in. A few other of my peers also showed up and so we all walked in together. The speaker welcomed us in warmly and filled us in the few minutes we missed. I had found out that there were much more resources that are available on campus to help settle on a major. I learned that talking to a professor in that field often helps because they might have past experience working in the jobs that we are seeking ourselves. Their insights can settle any wavering thought between majors or even convince us why not to pick that job.

Another thing that I learned was that making a LinkedIn will be beneficial when applying for jobs and internship. A lot of information that is not on our resume appears on our profile and it sheds a light on our personality that may not be seen during the interview. Also, we have to make sure that nothing inappropriate is posted or even shared to any of our social media accounts. Anything that is public can be found by future employers and seeing a picture of us drinking or anything else bad won’t be seen positively.

Overall, it was a pleasant experience because I had also learned that my peers were stuck in the same place I was in. The other students had some sense of what they wanted to do but was not sure of the first steps to take. I had thought that most of the other students at this school would already have their paths planned out but it was reassuring that they did not.

Museum visit

I got off the 7 train with my friend and we had over to the Queens Museum of Art. We picked this museum to go to because she wanted to grab food in Flushing right after we we’re done looking around. The museum was hard to find as it was in the opposite side of the park from where we entered. The park itself was bigger than we had expected and we were slightly tired by the time we got inside.

We began with the Tiffany Lamp exhibit as it was very bright and colorful. These stain-colored glass lamps were all unique from each other as no two lamps are made to look the same. Individually they are not so appealing but that maybe due to my disinterest in the arts. However, seeing all of them together made them look very harmonious. This represents the population of Baruch to me as every person I met so far has been different; some of whom I enjoy to hang out with after classes.

Next we visited The Wandering Lake by Patty Chang. This gallery struck out to me because there was a large model of the painting right in front of it. It almost bridged the gap between the artist and I. My friend told me that it reminded her of how different Baruch was on paper compared to when she first started. After adjusting to being a student at Baruch, Baruch felt more comfortable to be in, almost as if a second home. I agreed with this because to me, thinking about college was a bit stressful initially. It did not help with the amount of work that was foreshadowed during the first week of classes. As time went by, I found that by reworking my work and free time schedule, the workload was actually reasonable.

Volunteered

Starting out in college was a lot different from what I had expected. It seemed unlikely to know most of the people in your graduating class like in high school so it was very intimidating. I personally was slightly afraid of meeting new people as I had grown accustomed to my current group of friends after many years of hanging out with them. I thought that it would be very hard to meet new people and repeat this same process.

I attended a volunteer event due to the request of my friend. That friend of mine also happened to go to Baruch. It was an event that was not related to Baruch but one that helped me adapt to the life at Baruch. I had to cooperate with many other people who I had never met before and work together to unfold/fold chairs and tables, set up water bottles at booths and move furniture around. We had a lot of free time after setup because we had to wait for the event to start and the runners to come to us so we can give out water. In the time we waited, I learned how to get to know strangers around my age better and I ended up becoming friends with them.

After the event had ended, we all went out to get lunch together and talked about ourselves. I had learned that many of them come from schools that are slightly far away and they had come back to the weekend to help the community. Hearing this, I thought that there are good people out there who are not afraid to reach out to others. A new mindset was beginning to emerge where strangers are not to be afraid of and instead to be befriended. I think this was a great experience for me and that I should not underestimate the process of making new bonds.