For my next blogpost I attended the “Mandatory On Campus Recruiting Workshop”. First of all I learnt what OCR is. On-campus Recruitment is a special program for students in which recruiters from various companies interview students for either: full-time job openings (open only to seniors) or internship opportunities (open only to juniors). The presenter explained how to get started to this program. First of all, you need attend a mandatory OCR workshop. Upcoming workshops can be found on the SCDC website and they should be RSVP by every student who is planning to attend them. Secondly, you need to write a one-page resume which you should firstly be reviewed by SCDC before being submitted to employers. Thirdly, the one-page resume should be uploaded to STARR Search and after you should be able to apply to OCR job openings. And finally, you should prepare for your interviews.

The presenter showed some efficient ways to train and improve our skills before an interview. A good way to do this are mock interviews. Mock interviews are  emulations of  job interviews and they can be found in the STARR Search. To access them, all you got to do is login to your STARR Search website. You can build your own interview by selecting from about 1000 pre-recorded questions found in the website, select the “person” you want to do the interview with and get started. After you’re done, you can save the interview and review it or ask for feedback from other students, professors, mentors, career counselors etc. The presenter also told us that SCDC offers other ways to assist in interview preparations such as: interview preparation guides, workshops on “Mastering the Job Interview” or in-person Mock Interviews.

Overall, this was a pretty good experience. I learnt a lot about OCR and ways to improve my interview skills  which will be really useful for me in the future.

Baruch Voices is the last event we took part in. It is amazing to see some of our classmates on stage and I would say they did an amazing job. I’m kind of surprised but the number of people participating. However, I think the main point of the event is to keep the so-called Baruch spirit. It can be done through many forms and this is just one of them. The Voice allowed students to have their viewpoints expressed, and I think it is very important.

It is so sad that we are coming to the end of the session. I am pretty sure that we will miss everyone and everything in the class. Somehow we might not remember what happened or was taught in class (Sorry Dominique and Magi) but I’m sure everyone will miss each other’s presence. Maybe there will be a nod or a hello in the future when we see each other in the hallways, but the memories will stay.

I want to take this chance to say Thank You to everyone. I appreciated everyone’s company and presence which helped me being me here in this foreign place. I just want to say, Thank you and I love you all!!

For my final blogpost, I decided to attend the Baruch Voices event. Could have chosen other options, but I think this one would be the most pleasing and enjoyable one for me. Also, another reason why I chose this event is that some of my classmates were gonna perform there so that made it even more inviting for me.

Baruch Voices is an event where freshmen are allowed to perform monologues in front of a crowd of students. It’s an artistic portrayal of stories, messages and experiences performed by fellow freshmen who volunteer to share their monologues and use this event as a venue in order to let their voices be heard within Baruch.

Personally, I enjoyed all of the performances. Some of the performances were funny, some were dramatic but they all were unique and original. Our class had two girls as representatives. Both of them had prepared very interesting monologues, which I think were probably better than the majority of the monologues performed by other Baruch students. The most interesting one for me was Ginelli’s. It was very personal and I think it could be related to all of us and what we are experiencing at this stage of life.

I had a good time and I really enjoyed attending this event. I hope there will be similar events in the future as I’d be more than happy to attend them.

 

Baruch voices was such a great event. I was amazed by my entire classes monologues and how thoughtful and meaningful they all were. I loved being able to see my fellow classmates present their monologues in front of an audience of other people as their words were all worth hearing. The other kid’s monologues were cool too. There was one about Pokemon I didn’t quite fully catch on to. Maybe because I don’t know a single thing about Pokemon. All of my classmates did a great job. I should attend more school events TBH. I’m kind of sad FRO is over. I’m happy because I wont have to be at school until 5:30 but I will miss the class. Now when am I going to have an hour and 20 minutes to be loud and obnoxious and annoying?? I do wish that more people turned out to the event as I feel a lot of people would’ve enjoyed it. I think the event is a great idea and should be a bigger deal at Baruch. All of the monologues were so drastically different from each other and expressed so many different stories. Ginelli presented her monologue so confidently. I love the part where she talks about her rubber boots 😉 Luke’s outfit…I was truly blown away I felt so underdressed after I spotted him. Barry was distracting me at one point during the Pokemon speech, he was over it. We had to stay to watch Ginelli though and it was worth it. I must say Della’s speech was my favorite. It was so different and really touched my heart in a special way:) I was so proud of my FROmates and I hope we all remain in touch or at least smile to each other as we pass in school for as long as were together. <

Baruch Voices, an opportunity for Baruch students (particularly first-semester freshmen) to display their talents through their voices. This can take many forms, such as poetry, spoken word, song, etc. In the case of my FRO classmate Ginelli,  she chose to express herself in a poem. Through her words she exclaimed her desire to fulfill her dreams, living life as she intended; in happiness. She talks about what many college students are facing today regarding their career. Is it better to live life the way you want it, doing what you love regardless of how lucrative it may be, or is it prudent to garner a degree to fulfill your means? Ginelli is no stranger to this. An aspiring, talented and passionate dancer who has a clear view of the dreams and goals she wishes to achieve, but is faced with that daunting choice of choosing a career/major more “beneficial” to her in the long run. Moreover, she goes on to say that despite this, she is happy. Happy being Ginelli. Happy knowing that she is passionate about something and will continue to pursue her dreams while also gaining that degree to fulfill her means. She’s happy being Ginelli.

I thoroughly enjoyed her performance. Although I was very late and arrived at the end of Baruch Voices, I was able to watch her performance on video while also having had the privilege to witness it live the week before in class. It was very personal, touching, and relatable as I am sure there are many of us college students who are living in confusion or even fear with what the future holds for us career-wise. The point I believe Ginelli was trying to make is to stay true to yourself. This will provide clarity and peace of mind. Certain things will be revealed as life moves on and decisions will be easier to make. In short, it was an outstanding performance.

On April 15, I went to the Networking etiquette workshop by the Starr career development center. It was a very informative workshop in which we were told about how to network with professionals. As soon as the workshop started we were told to get food and settle down in our seats. So after taking the food, the first thing she told us was to always keep your right hand empty. It was because when you are at a networking event, you are there to meet people and if you have a plate in your right hand and a glass of water on the other hand, you cannot shake hands with people.  She than further talked about different ways that we should behave at a networking event and after explaining we were asked to meet different people in the conference and network with them.We were told that at an event when there are a group of people talking together, how should we try to join the conversation and how to leave that group by giving different excuses. We were also told to make student business cards for ourselves so that we can give them to the people we meet in the event. Than she told us to always thank those people twice. First thank you should be at the end of conversation and and the second thank you should be in the form of a written thank you note that you should mail it to their address. I met 7 people and they were all very nice and were of different ages and backgrounds. I became friends with one guy who has joined me in the wall street club. Overall this was a great event and I learned a lot about networking.

It’s always hard to know whether you are doing things right or wrong, and when I mean things, I mean life situations, moments or certain episodes in your lifetime that has affected you. Have I ever did something that I didn’t regret the next day, month, or even year. Of course I did, nobody is perfect and will never be. Humans are created to make mistakes, evolve, improve and keep striving towards perfection. It is an undeniable cycle of progression, the vital part of humankind survival, Theory of Darwin.
Ever since I was a child, I was motivated to outdo my father, as I compared my achievements and basically whole life to his age by age, goal after goal, success after success mark. For example, how many books has my father read by the age of 18 comparing to the number of books I’ve read by the age of 18. It was a really an exciting journey for me as I imitated my father in everything and tried to beat him in everything, even practiced he’s stares that he gives during business meetings and tried to improve it. For me it was more than just a goal or a dream factor, for me it was a pushing force- the key to ignition towards making me the person I am today. All my life I’ve lived by a code and the code is simple: respect the elder, love your family, and be proud of who you are and where you come from. To me these are the core values as I truly respect my roots and bloodline.
Family is my main priority and ever since I was a child my mother taught me to be close to my brothers and close to my relatives because after there’s nothing left, no money, fame, reputation ,success, there’s always going to be family behind your back. Sadly, when I was at the age of 5 my mother and father divorced and that created a huge turmoil in our big family, as my father’s brothers told him that he’s wrong and that he should have not divorced my mother just because of the kids, but sadly now I understand that you can’t dictate your heart whom to love, and with that I totally understand my father and don’t blame him for the whole family incident, which by the way resulted in a complete hatred between the brothers and total non-recognition of each other. Imagine, having your cousins playing with you every single day after kindergarten or us going together to the park, or having family dinner, and family events, everything gone in a glimpse of an eye. As you see their ghosts playing with you on the playground and you are trying to reach them with your hand and they suddenly evaporate. For more than ten years, I haven’t seen my cousins, even though we were in the same country, same city, same area, same bloodline. After being programmed by my father’s new wife to hate on my relatives and completely deny their existence. Ten years later, I accidentally met up with my Auntie, as she said “Damir you grew up so much, I love you and I miss you. Sorry for disappearing for a long time.” I was programmed to think that everything she says or does is a direct endangerment to me and my existence. The fact that I thought that all my Auntie wanted was my father’s money and blood at the age of 14 makes me realize that live can change in a matter of night, just simply flip 180 and never again rotate. This feeling of abandoning my core values and family ideals made my a very curious child, teenager, and person in general, as I seek multiple ways on how unite the family and bring the good ol’ days back in the present. But who’s going to listen to the youngest son in the family. Who’s going to take my advice or my desire to help seriously? For everyone in my family back when I was 14, nobody really took me seriously as everyone had their problems to deal with. The feeling of somewhat unimportance and irrelevance sparked the fire of motivation in me as I decided to study abroad and improve as a person in general: become smarter, become better, become successful by any means, and of course become more sophisticated and improve my business skills so that one day my family would take me seriously enough to hear me out and hopefully follow my lead. Therefore I take this whole family incident as a part of evolution and improvement of our family ties. The next generation learns on the mistakes and tries to solve them thus keep striving towards an improvement. Maybe it was necessary for my father and his brothers collapse the family bond and create conflict, in order to make me the person I am today who has a much broader outlook on the world than his Father, who managed to do some of the things that he’s father had never managed to achieve, maybe it was destiny, or just a human mistake, but it doesn’t matter because what truly matters is that I evolve, improve, and strive towards the better. As my ultimate goal in life, is to reunite my family, forge even a stronger bond, create a peace between our future generations, and eventually prolong and enhance our family legacy.