Final Reflection Paper

In the beginning of this film, it appears these men were struggling to be truthful and honest. They were making sure it was a safe place to do so. They all came to discuss their experiences and learn from other men’s experiences. As the film went on I was impressed by their ability to continue to talk about the hard topics related to racism in our country. They all took many risks to explain their experience and question when other members’ thoughts were inaccurate within the group setting. After watching the rest of the color of fear I have seen a big change in everyone in the group, especially David Christensen.

As an individual, I am always seeking the truth, because one cannot form an opinion without accurate facts. In addition, I believe that our society is lacking the values of compassion and empathy, so I try to practice the Golden Rule as often as possible. Being raised as an active Christian within the United Methodist Church, I believe that my most significant values stem from Sunday school lessons and mission trips. Of course, my parents are at the core of such an upbringing, so their influence cannot be excluded. During Sunday school and youth group lessons, I learned the importance of spreading God’s love onto others through acts of honesty and kindness. If I don’t like a person, I am still expected to treat that person with the humility and respect that God would. As a result, the issue of civility becomes paramount to my interactions with classmates and co-workers.

Wednesday, September 27 2015 at 4pm I began my closing shift at Chop’t Creative Salad, located 11 West 42nd Street, New York, NY 10036. My job focuses on serving salads, although wraps are also available. I believe that the food we serve at my job can turn pricey. I recorded the demographics of the type of people that can afford it is obvious.

Over the course of the semester, I have been fortunate enough to work with a student who is having difficulties when it comes to reading. My student does not have difficulties when it comes to hearing a word, but rather when he sees a word. My student has definitely benefited from one on one work with me as well as the additional help he’s getting from the reading specialist during their WIN (what I need) time. My student does not like to read because he knows that he is struggling and he is embarrassed about it. When my student goes to his WIN time, he does really well because the instruction is at his level and there are only two other students who are also on the same level there as well. Besides the current intervention, programs I would recommend are Direct Instruction: Reading Mastery, Letter Spacing, Wilson Reading System and the Lindamood program (LiPS).

Before this summer we were still in high school, thinking about where we were going to be for the next four years of our lives. About what we were going to study and what we want to do for the rest of our lives. Now I am just thinking back to everything I learned over the years, it was all just teachers pushing a lot of information into our heads trying to make us memorize everything we needed to know. There were only a select few that really tried to teach us and not just ram information into us. I remember my sophomore year in high school my English teacher was also the coach for most of the school’s sports. Even though he had so much to think about he still took the time to try and make us learn in an unique way. Instead of having us write essays about things we did not want to read he would make us debate. Everyone would get excited because why not put something teens like doing with something they do not like doing. Arguing, something they liked doing, and English, something that most did not like to do. We sat through a lot of pointless class periods that we thought we were not going to learn anything from. But now I realize that what they were saying was important. They each had their own way to teach but all were teaching the same thing to some extent. Now we have to face the adjustments between high school writing and college writing and also everything else it brings to our plates.

The impact each system can have on such a young adult. In high school kids like Sparkle, Lawrence, and Marcus deal with issues at home, different states. The microsystem can affect other microsystems in a child’s life. Marcus was arrested and put in jail for 3 nights for fighting and possession of drugs. Marcus is not old enough to even drink, and he has already slept in jail? These experiences are clear factors that impact a child’s life. Marcus’s parents may be amazing people, but Marcus and themselves know that they have a drinking issue. With issues at home kids like Marcus tend to lash out in other social institution such as school. He gets angry and starts to fight other students leading to other consequences short and long term.

After going through this module and watching the videos, I learned that I judge a lot more than I thought I did. Since I have been out of my parent’s house, I have significantly changed my attitude toward society in that I give people a break. Like with the example of a person speeding—for about the last year, I do not get mad at people for flying past me on the interstate because I know what is it like to be that person and I have learned that it is not fair to be judged for being an “a**hole” when really, that person might be trying to get home to their sick kid.

Have you ever encountered a problem that you've wanted to solve, but you had absolutely no idea where to start? I seem to encounter these problems on a daily basis. Most of the time I just ignore it and move on, but this time around I decided to figure out the steps it would take to reach my goal. I've decided to make a change in my church and stop my youth group from excluding people due to their sexual orientation. This problem means a lot to me because although I'm not part of the LGBTQ community myself, I've seen my close friends who are part of that community stray from God due to the way that my youth group treats them.

As a health care professional, it’s important to understand and work in the community. As a part of this assignment I had the opportunity to work for the Orange County Rape Crisis Center. In healthy people 2020 one of the goals is to better understand, find the trends, and preventing bullying, dating violence, and sexual violence among youth. Also, Healthy2020 focuses on the LBGTQ community as well. The Rape Crisis Center is a non-profit organization the focuses on people that had been, know someone, and educate the community about sexual violence. I had the pleasure of meeting with Gentry Hodnett. She heads the volunteers and she the coordinator of the organization. Gentry mention that their mission statement is to “stop sexual violence and its impact through support, education, and advocacy”. (G.Hodnett, personal communication, June,15,2017). Gentry and I talk about a lot of things but mostly we talked about how the company got started, and how the center impacts the community. Also, I wanted to talk about the work I did in the community.

I have a few miscellaneous thoughts going through my head and it is about what we have spoken about in the past few weeks. Acting in an adversary v. mutualistic way. I think the adversary will always be there, it is inevitable with all of our identities and individualism, which some reject, but I doubt anybody can push it completely aside. I think this is bigger than the question of Capitalism v. Communism. Respectively, one renders a society to think individualistic; the other renders a society to think collectively and to thrive for equality and, perhaps from my point of view, a homogeneous society.

Before I stepped in Old Main 111 in the beginning of this semester, I would call myself a moral scepticist and ethical egoist. I would agree with Glaucon — in Book II of Plato’s Republic — that if a virtuous person and a rogue were given two magical rings respectively, both would take the gruesome course because they are freed from reprisal. In a Hobbesian world, moral judgments could not be true; they were simply our emotions which maximizes our pleasure. No normative moral theory would not direct us to how we ought to act.

As part of fieldwork hours I attended events several events. The two events that I loved most were a workshop and a documentary screening. The workshop at BMCC on October 12, 2017 was titled “Anti-bullying and School Violence” and the documentary, also at BMCC as part of pride month following the story of Moises Serrano, an undocumented, gay man living in North Carolina titled, “Forbidden: Undocumented and Queer in Rural America.” was screened on October 23, 2017. I learned so much through both of these events and I feel strongly about them. They taught me that children should find safety in schools, teachers should create a safe environment, and that they should know about what goes in children's lives.

Upon asking my Grammy to be my interviewee for this final project, I was relatively apprehensive- questioning if I have ever even said the word sex in front of her. A few hours after Thanksgiving lunch, I tried to bite the bullet as casually as possible, “by the way, Grammy, could I interview you for one of my history classes, I have to write a paper on a conversation?” “Sure”, she replied, “about what?” “It’s actually supposed to be your opinion about the Sexual Revolution and your experiences in it, it’s no big deal”, I quickly added. “Sure honey, I don’t know how helpful I’ll be though, I must have slept through that,” she wittily answered.

My experience this semester has truly been humbling. Not only did I gain experience but I also contributed to a higher purpose at UTA. For me this was more than just a grade or just to get to graduation, it was the foundation to a new legacy for the Communication Department. Comm Attire is now a student organization and will plan to open sometime next semester. Dr. Wigley and her future students will continue to grow and add to the project, in hopes to make it bigger and better than ever. I am excited to see what will become of Comm Attire in the future.

Towards the beginning of the semester, I feel as though I was an oblivious college freshman, unaware of all the sickening events that occur to students everyday within the school system and the struggles some children encounter on a daily basis. This course has opened my mind to a lot of different scenarios that occur in schools every day that I was initially unaware of.