Capstone Cinema - The Stoning of Soraya M.

This movie was shown at the theater and I felt it was a very serious and deep movie. The film details a young Iranian women's tragic story of abuse and murder by her husband who seeks to get rid of her. the film did a great job of showing the plight of women across the middle east where in some places women are not allowed d basic rights and protections. what happens to soraya is horrible and yet it is something that still happens in some places across the world. i feel that if every student sees this film then many would be outraged enough to try and start  movement to fix the injustices shown in the film. Overall as sad as the movie was I am happy I went to see it because of the cultural awareness it brought to me by watching it.

Capstone Challenge

My challenge was a little complex to start with but I feel that I have completed it this semester. My challenge had three parts: to do good in french, to do get a job on campus, and to become a executive member of Carolina productions. I have achieved all three over the course of this semester. I have been working at the Russel house for about three months now and it is a great place to work. I also am doing okay in French and hopefully will get a good grade on my exam coming up next Saturday. Lastly I am officially going to be the next cultural awareness coordinator for CP as of Tuesday which means that I managed to complete all three parts of my goal.

Wrap Up on Service

The most enjoyable part of my service was the trip out to the elementary school I took about a month ago. actually seeing the kids and seeing cocky interacting with them was great and it really inspired me to want to work more with the program. I loved the way the kids reacted to reading and because of that visit I am convinced that the program is worth the time and money the college devotes to it. I found my time there beneficial because I feel like I played a part in building students literacy skills in south Carolina. Lastly I am looking forward to volunteering for Cocky's Reading express next semester and maybe going on a few more trips !!!

Career Center and Thanksgiving

"As we express our gratitude, we must never forget that the highest appreciation is not to utter words, but to live by them." -John Fitzgerald Kennedy

The career center speech was interesting and after listing to it I feel sure that I will try to do an internship next year during fall or spring. The numerous resources available at the cent were interesting and I am happy that I know about them now so I can take advantage of them. The most useful was the information that freshman should prepare resumes as early as freshman year which was interesting to me because I had no idea we should start so early. When I was a kid I wanted to grow up and be three main things. One was a soccer player, two was a hockey player and three was a photographer at different times. My thanksgiving plans are complicated as I will leave here on Tuesday at about 2:00 and go to Myrtle Beach to my mother’s house. I will have thanksgiving at my grandmother’s house and then Thursday night I am going home to New York for the weekend to see my family up there. I can’t wait as my favorite parts of the year are the times I get to spend back in New York!!!

Finance

“If you think nobody cares if you’re alive, try missing a couple of car payments.” -Earl Wilson

I see myself as a financially responsible person. I do not spend money often and when I do I usually try to make sure it’s on something I really want. Sometimes I find I spend some money on some things that are somewhat frivolous but I try not to do it too often. I do not really prepare a budget but I have my bank account set up to divide up my weekly check into different categories with only  part of my check going to my checking account which I consider my actual spending money. As far as when I graduate I hope to have a little bit of money to get off on a good start but overall I am not that worried. I have always had the opinion that even if you finish college with a large amount of student debt as long as you majored in something that you enjoyed and will get you a job in something that you want to do then debt will not matter because you will make enough money to pay off your student loans.  I do hope to not have any debt outside of student’s loans however and I plan to do that simply by working for most of my college experience and buying everything I need with cash. Also depending on what I do after college I can find ways to get part of my debt taken away through programs such as teach for America.

Capstone Social

I have attended numerous Capstone socials this semester and enjoyed all of them. I feel like the social events are what really contribute to the feeling of a separate capstone community. The social events are awesome places to meet new people. The Shack is a great place to have the events as it is close to capstone and also a unique place for just capstone scholars. Having are own hang out area is great and the events there are cool because of things like the Wii and snacks. Overall the social events are one of my favorite parts of the capstone program especially the “everybody’s birthday party” because it involves free cake what more could you ask for.

Capstone Conversation

The Capstone conversation I attended featured Professor Dan Fowler and was one of the most interesting events I have attended on campus this year. Professor fowler is the former head of the DNC and is extremely knowledgeable on the subject of Government and Politics. He spent a lot of time talking about his thoughts on the economic downturn and also on his beliefs about the tea party movements. His ideas were interesting in that they were somewhat novel ideas and ways of thinking that I had not thought of before. His emphasis on the tea party not being a lower class unemployed movement but a movement of middle class rural families was exceptional because it changes the dynamic of the tea party and allow someone to better understand why they make the demands they do. Lastly Dr. Fowler’s leadership in the DNC was interesting to me because of my own liberal democratic leanings. Overall I am extremely happy to have met and listen to Professor Fowler during his conversation.

Stress

In times of great stress or adversity, it's always best to keep busy, to plow your anger and your energy into something positive.  ~ Lee Iacocca ~

There are several things that can stress me out on any given day. School work, work, class, family and personal problems can all stress me out at times if I let them. I have a couple of ways that I like to deal with stress personally. Sometimes just sitting down and relaxing for a bit can help but most of the time it just stresses me out more. A lot of what Mr. Medlin did in class seemed to help some of the other students but it really did not help me much because I feel that I am the type of person that gets over things by doing them. If I am stressing out about work the only way for me to become unstressed is to actually go to work and get it over with. Or if I have a paper do and I am really stressing over it then I can only get over it by actually writing the paper and getting it over with. I don’t really see how you can become less stressed about something if you still have to do it. If I feel like I am totally going to go nuts however there are two things that I often do. One is form a calendar list with the times and days when things are due so that I can plan ahead a bit. The other thing that I always do is listening to music. I think that listing to music may be more of a way of forgetting about the stress for a bit until I have time to get done whatever needs to be done.

Time Management

Make use of time, let not advantage slip. ~William Shakespeare ~

I feel like I have done an okay job of time management this semester but I could have done batter. I always see time management as a work in process meaning I can be really good at it for a while and then really bad. I feel that I should try ad work to keep a middle line but that when I realize that time management is not really something you can perfect and be good at forever because sometimes…. Stuff happens… which really can throw of any time management you might have had. I feel that as long as I try my best to continue to work at my time management then I can improve next semester. The things I did not have time for this semester were a lot of the events and conversations that happened on campus. Due to my work and class schedule I was unable to make most of those events so next semester I am changing my work days around and taking more early classes so that by the end of the day I have plenty of time to attend the great programs offered by the college.

Health and Friends

Water, air, and cleanliness are the chief articles in my pharmacopoeia.  ~ Napoleon

I consider myself a somewhat healthy person. I try to eat right mostly and stay away from the grill part of the lunch room.  When I was a kid my grandparents babysat me a lot and they are big on eating right so naturally I grew up loving a lot of healthy foods. I never really get sick as I always try to stay healthy and have a good immune system from growing up in a house where my mother worked in the hospital which led me to develop a good immune system.  I love the campus of USC which has a lot of trees and open areas that can be extremely refreshing in the morning or after a long day. I have formed a lot of new friendships at USC and as far as my success I have not had a lot of big success moments so far but I believe when the times come they will be supportive. I love the quote by napoleon though because whenever I am feeling bad or sick a shower and a walk outside with some music always makes me feel better.

Religion -vs- Spirituality

"Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, & the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people." Karl Marx

         Religion, Spirituality and faith are very different to me. Religion is something man made used by people to express how spirituality makes them feel. Faith is the tool used by the religious elite to persuade the people to follow their beliefs and have faith in what they say is right. Spirituality is a true heavenly feeling felt by people in certain people and moments of time in my opinion. Spirituality is truly unique in that it can only be felt but not understood. I feel like spirituality does not have to be explained and that religion is just the futile attempts of certain people to make sense of what they feel.  IN my opinion spirituality is the closet one can come to feeling a godly presence and otherworldly feeling. Therefore I tend to believe I am a spiritual person with my own morals and set of beliefs but as far as organized religion at this point in time I feel capable enough to understand my beliefs on my own without the need to have someone else try to tell me what they cannot truly understand themselves because in my opinion no matter how hard one studies spirituality it can never be truly explained or understood and that is what makes it special. The south is interesting in that it is very religious but often in my opinion I see religion used in the south, as it is often used elsewhere, as an excuse some people use to be able to try and explain their hatred and ignorance on some issues such as minority rights and racial intolerance. I think USC is nice though because there is such a blend of cultures and religions that create a somewhat welcoming environment for people of all races, religions, cultures, sexualities and nationality’s.

Leadership

Nearly all men can stand adversity, but if you want to test a man’s character, give him power.
~Abraham Lincoln

 

Leadership is something I continually strive to gain experience in every day.  A lot of what I want to do in life is dependent on me developing good leadership skills. I want to maybe run for congress or maybe serve as a judge or DA all of which require extraordinary leadership. To me leadership is something that is really hard to describe but can be easily seen. For example one of my favorite historical figures is Abraham Lincoln. Lincoln was a extraordinary leader and was able to take control of the situation and the lead the union though a traumatic and chaotic rebellion and war. I think leadership is something that you gain not through study or watching but by taking control and doing your best to make the best decisions possible. Leadership can only be gained through personal experiences and trial in my opinion. I have been a leader in several organizations in high school. I was on student council and was vice president in my schools media club. I was also president in both my high school interact club and reading mentor club which I really enjoyed because it allowed me to use my talents to help other people. I hope to be a leader in the coming years as an orientation leader and maybe serving as a Carolina Productions executive member.

Study Abroad and Service

I am interested in a student exchange an am already planning on taking part in the student exchange with Warwick University in England. I am looking forward to going to England and seeing some of the historical landmarks and places. If I could go anywhere else it would probably be Russia and Poland because I love to study eastern European culture and history. I love to travel and Europe is extremely interesting to me. I have traveled to Canada which is sort of European and I really enjoyed it. My service site so far has been okay. My favorite part is probably that I can listen to music while stamping books I guess. Overall I can’t wait till I really get out to the sites to read to the kids so that I feel like I am actually making a difference.

Hope For The Future - Diversity

I am going to start out with my service site and say that I have not really had a chance to see diversity there as I mostly have been just stickering books. My view of diversity has not changed much at USC because I know I had a good view of diversity before I came here due to the fact that my high school was diverse and the place I have lived have each been somewhat unique and allowed me to meet a lot of people that I liked and disliked. Also being from another state defiantly teaches someone diversity especially if they are as different as New York and SC. To define how I saw diversity before coming here (and how I see it now) is kind of hard to put into words but I can try to explain it. Diversity in my opinion is something that people have to see in order to learn about. Every time someone meets a new person they often pick out what’s different about that person from their selves or their friends. The things that they can pick out as being different, and somewhat new to them, are diversity. For example if a person from a religious and somewhat conservative family goes to the city and meets a metrosexual they will in their heads pick out the things that are different about the city person such as different clothes and ideas and attitude. The things they pick out whether they realize it or not are diversity. That’s sort of how I always thought about diversity things that you can pick out are different from you or what you know. To go on a sort of liberal slant for a moment, I think that the day people learn to see diversity as not something to fear or hate but something to appreciate will be the day when earth become perfect.

Traditions

I have taken part in 5 Carolina traditions so far I believe. The first one was first night Carolina which although it was rained out and held in the Russell house instead, was kind of a cool event and defiantly helped the first night transition go a lot smoother. The second one was the first year reading experience which we all had to take a part in that I somewhat enjoyed but I thought maybe a different book would have been nicer. I went to a football game and therefore fulfilled two traditions in that I said the alma matter with the rest of the crowd and also heard the fight song being played during the game which was pretty cool. The last tradition I think I have fulfilled is I always take a look at the newspaper every day of the week  because The daily gamecock often has some pretty cool stories in it and it’s nice to read about things going on on campus. As far as tradition off campus my favorite tradition has to be going back Home to new york every summer because well I may have lived in south Carolina a bit and Colombia is nice and all I still miss New York and my family up there sometimes so the visit is awesome.

Fall Break

Since I have already got back from fall break I will say what I did instead of what my plans were I guess. I went back to Myrtle Beach on Thursday and visited my father and stepmother and brother which was a fun night because we watched a redbox movie and had some Chinese food which is hard to find around Columbia In my opinion. Friday I went to my mother’s house and went to go see the new movie RED which was awesome. And Saturday I went to my grandmothers and helped her decorates for Halloween and made the yard look mad scary. On Sunday I rode the bus back to Columbia and got back at about 5:00 and cleaned the room which is now spotless. Overall fall break was nice but I am happy to be back home in Columbia where all the action goes down.  

Alcohol Day

I learned some things in class on alcohol day but most I already knew. One thing I did learn was that the University is so strict that they have some measures like a DD getting in trouble that I don’t agree with but it’s up to them to decide what is best for the school I guess. During class I felt kind of felt weird I guess like I always do when things like alcohol are talked about because I believe it is more of a personal choice and that people will figure out themselves what their ideas on the subject are by trial and error. One thing I did like though is that Brent led the discussion which no offense to Jimmie, made it seem a little less professor to student and more like an older student to a newer student sort of conversation that may have helped some people get the facts. I do not know what classes I am tacking next semester as my advisement is not till November but I am hoping to take some higher level history classes possibly.

Another Service Post

My time at Cocky’s reading express so far has been okay to some extent. I mostly have just helped with labeling books and applying stickers to them during my sessions but I hope to try and go on one of the trips soon. I wish I could spend more than an hour a week and most likely I could possibly find time between classes or wake up earlier one day to help but at the moment I am just doing one hour a week. However I am sure that even after Univ 101 ends I will continue to help out Cockys reading express. I am not sure what to write for my strengths. I am going to be truthful and say that I am more prone to see my weaknesses then my strengths and usually I only know what I am good at if someone tells me that I am. One thing I think I may be good at though so far is attending class. I see a lot of people missing class a lot and while I may be late on assignments sometimes (like now…..) I always try to make class no matter what. I have volunteered with the USC democrat club this year too but I am looking forward to maybe helping out with the Boo at the Zoo during Halloween because it looks like it would be a cool way to see the zoo and help out.

Brain Rules - Midterm - Majors - And Other Wicked Cool Things......

My initial perception of brain rules is that it will bill a ghastly read because of how long it is. I really hope we are not reading the whole book because after the first little bit I read it think the intire book will be bloody terrible but maybe it will pick up a bit. Maybe that is a bit harsh but it seems to be a wee bit on the dull side. The chaps at the major and information fair were interesting and certainly persuasive somewhat but I feel like I’ve known what I wanted to do forever now so it will take a lot more to get me to even think about changing my major. I did not see either the history, criminal justice, or political science major desk there but to be honest I did not look that well as I was merely passing through on my way to  getting some grub from the cafeteria so I only saw some of the blatantly obvious stands throughout the crowd.  The best part of the fair was seeing some of the dodgy majors the university has that I would never have though were offered here. Anyway fall break is only a fortnight away and a brilliant movie is playing tonight at the theater so cheerio.

Campus Safety And The Rest

Update time getting started earlier today whew…. My classes are going great I think I just go my history paper back and my UNIV paper and both were great grades so I am really happy. My chem. test is okay and French is starting to pick up a little so as far as classes go no worries there. My favorite class at the moment is History probably, not that I dislike UNIV 101 but history is just interesting to me so it works out. I have not met with any of my professors out of class yet but I am working on asking Dr. Childs for a office interview session for my paper. I am not a big fan of having lunch with someone I barley know much less in a professional sort of environment so I think I will opt to a more informal office hours session. I look forward to getting to know some more about Dr. Childs as he is a history professor and therefore would have a lot of information on my major and classes to look out for. The safety Presentation was pretty funny as well so congrats to the “Brotha”.

Cocky's Reading Express ----- Chuu Chuu

After visiting my site for Cocky’s Reading Express I am excited to go on a trip to a school. I am somewhat disappointed at the moment that the dates and times are not the best for my schedule by I feel confident that sometime over the semester I will get a chance to go on a trip to a school. I am worried a bit that there will be no trips that fit but it that is the case then I will try my best to make one of the trips fit by maybe asking my professor for one of my classes if I could miss class for a community service project if I promise to make up the work or something.  Overall though regardless of what happens I hope to gain some valuable community service and I hope that threw this program I can feel that I am doing something to give back to the community. Overall I am interested to see where this program will go and excited to start volunteering over the next few weeks.

Capstone And USC

My experience with capstone so far has been excellent. The program is interesting in that it provides numerous social and educational events on campus that have enriched my college experience so far. The capstone community is also nice to have because in a school of thousands of students capstone really feels like a smaller tight knit community. Most of the people in capstone I have met are extremely nice and friendly. Also in capstone people are devoted to service learning and good grades which makes it easy to find common ground with people. Also since everyone is hardworking and invested in their study’s it makes finding study partners a lot easier. Capstone house is also awesome in that out of all the dorms on campus I have visited it is in my opinion the best.

                After being at USC for a month now I think my expectations for college are about the same as my experience except for a few things. One is that I expected college to be hard but I did not expect that so much work could be due all at the same time like it was week. Also after months I can honestly ysayt hat my fear of a bad roommate or doom are totally gone as I am happy with my roommate and dorm. Overall so far it’s going great.

Time Management - Goal Setting - Personal Challenge

My goals that I set were to one pass French class, two keep a job and make enough money for a snowboarding trip during spring break and three to do good enough in CP to earn the VIP status award for the club. i think the job and club are easier to attain because I somewhat enjoy both of those activity’s whereas French is a constant chore to get myself to commit to the work.MY personal challenge I think Is maybe having something o do with French because second languages were always hard for me and it would be a challenge to make a good grade in a college level French. However my challenge may change because I am not too sure of my specifics yet. Whatever my goal Is I expect to accomplish it by sustained determination and stalwart persistence throughout the year in order to work towards it with a couple of steps at a time.

Academic Success

I think my Lassi results (that are MIA at the moment) were pretty accurate when it comes to describing me. the few I agreed with the most were the time management that I got a 15 on and the 0 on use of study aids.I think that the time management is spot on because I sometimes have problems with setting specific times to do specific things. I have everything I need to do plugged in on my phones calender but the problem comes when it is that actual time to do something and I don't want to do it and lack of a bit only to have to complete it in a rush later on. The use of study aids I agree with to but I don't really think that it is such a bad thing. I don't go to tutoring or help clinics because from a young age I was taught to do the work by myself and that If you worked hard those aids you would not need the aids to help. I don't think badly of people who use them but I just don't see myself using them in the near future so that score will probably remain the way it is. My anxiety, selecting main Ideas and information processing scores were all really high and i think that comes out allot in my day to day routine. I don't really worry about allot of things because I am usually able to calm myself down and work to get hings done when i start to get a little anxious. as far as the SMI and IPS I feel that at times I can really be a analytical person who asses situations by looking at the major things first so I feel those scores were pretty accurate. the only score I really want to work on is maybe my concentration. Maybe I can focus on trying to find ways to focus myself I hope over the course of this year but overall I'm not that anxious about it.

SERVICE LEARNING

I have a lot of experience with service in the past through personal commitment and club activities. I am a very political and world influenced person I like to think and I choose to put my faith in human beings and therefor I enjoy any opportunity to help out my fellow man.IN high school I was president of the interact club and the reading mentors program 2 programs that were community service organizations. I also volunteered at a local library for a couple of mouths and did other projects with other organizations like the beat club and Red Cross. As far as service connected with a course I have not had much experience because my high school did not have any courses like that unfortunately. If I could provide service anywhere I would love to help in tons of different places. I would love to be able to help out in Africa and Eastern Europe where the conditions in some places are extremely bad and unstable. I would also like to help here at home in one of the major cities like Washington or NYC where the people are so resilient and involved in the world. As to what I would be doing I would like to do anything that would best help me assist those who need assistance but I would above all love a leadership position that would allow me to make use of numerous resource’s to truly make an impact on the community.

Labor Day

My labor day was pretty standard by American standards. I went to my mother’s house over the weekend to visit family for my birthday that’s the 12th. On Labor Day we had a cookout at my grandmother’s house for Labor Day and my birthday. During the day we had went and saw Dinner for Schmucks the movie which was pretty funny all in all. Unfortunately though well I was in Myrtle Beach I realized how much I wanted to get back to Columbia. It’s not that I wanted to get away from family (okay maybe just a little), but because I feel that I sort of belong here now and I love it. So as nice as the mini-break was here’s to wishing that fall break doesn’t come early this year.

Fun Fact: Labor Day was first celebrated in 1882 in New York City, see all good things come out of NY

INVOLVEMENT

Walking around at the organization fair was really exciting because it was to me a great way to find things to do around campus. The wide variety of clubs was overwhelming at first but easy to manage as I walked up the rows and picked up stuff that looked interesting. There were tons of club members that were very helpful in informing me of all the wonderful activity’s there clubs do. The only bad part was the barrage of churches trying to stuff their fliers into your hands at every turn but they weren’t that bad… I already joined Carolina Productions and am looking forward to getting involved with the college democrats and maybe the TWLOHR Club here on campus plus a couple of others maybe. I figure well I’m here and don’t have a job yet (Unfortunately) I might as well make the most of all my down time. If I had to start one organization up that I did not already see I might have considered some sort of motivational speakers clubs that would as a group work on their skill in an effort to become better motivators for their friends and fellow Carolinians.

Lifelines

Photo is on Backorder for now and I think I filled in the right bio blocks on my profile but not too sure. I feel like my tad bit longer then asked for PowerPoint summed up my story well enough though just in case.



My expectations for USC are kind of wide and varied I think. I feel like i expect to be able to find where i belong after college. In the meantime i feel like I expect to develop new friend ships and connections as well as new interests that will help me in the coming years.


I’ve traveled a lot and moved around a lot as a kid so I feel i have in my past been put in new experiences that where shocking and somewhat of an adventure.

Not really I'm really good about seeing things coming before there going to happen and being somewhat prepared for them when they come so not really.

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