I Am A Student, An Unfocused Writer

The journey that has brought me to this class has been dependent on my academic drive. I am currently a dual enrollment student and this class is one of many steps along the path to receiving an AA degree. I am taking advantage of the opportunities that dual enrollment offers and furthering my understanding of literature with this course.

In 2006 I started college because it’s what one is supposed to do after High School. It soon matured to, going to college to find myself. Where that meant experiencing a breadth of topics that captivate and inspire me to seek out answers; which hasn’t changed. Every class I took gave me new perspectives where I gained understanding to allow me to be more open, and greater insight. However, the obstacles of still being a teenager, trying to find myself, left me struggling to cope with my studies and every-day life. Forcing me to hit the pause button my student life.

I have grown as a reader, thinker and writer thanks to this course. These are the things that I have worked on and improved over the past couple of months and I feel that my work shows this. In no way do I mean to sound over confident, I know I still have plenty to learn. However, I am extremely surprised and proud of myself. I will admit I had thoughts of previously giving up, I allowed myself to focus too much on the negative. Now, however, I feel differently. I have learned through this course how to write, how to express myself, and how to find the answers to the things that I don 't know. Most importantly, I learned to

Rain is crucial to all living things from every walk of life. Rain brings destruction and regrowth, leaving a clean slate and a new beginning. I selected this theme because while the focal point and characters change throughout my writing the constant idea throughout my pieces consisted of moving on, growing, and starting a new beginning. I think that lately my writing has been full of an unknown tone, an excitement/ fear of growing up and starting over. I believe this is all because I've reached a point in my life where I’m going to college and moving away. I’m delighted to be able to go out on my own and experience new things, but it’s kind of nostalgic to know that my childhood is coming to a close. However I’m aware that not all people

I have never been an excellent student and perennially struggled with English, Math, and Science growing up. These subjects would cast a pall over my day and school work. Anxiety would well up inside of me which often resulted with me passed out across my desk sleeping through parts of class. When I would return home at day’s end, I rarely completed my homework. When I did try to complete homework, it often ended in tears of frustration or the hurling of a book across the room. Taking this class has helped to quell a portion of that anxiety and frustration. It was a grueling class, seemingly impossible at times, but taking this class has given me the confidence to know that not only can I finish the class if I work hard but can also excel! Writing is something that I will exercise throughout my college curriculum and my life. It will help to convey my ideas to the instructor, peers, bosses, and co-workers. In my college curriculum, it will also show my instructors that I’m learning the information provided and how to apply that knowledge appropriately. It will allow me to complete assignments, discussions, and reports, and I will also apply writing in basic communication when necessary.

Before English I had only taken a nursing college class and it didn’t really feel like a college class because I was doing something I really liked. In the English class it was like a real college course and I had to actually sit there and listen to a professor, it was so boring at times; but writing the papers was fun. I had learned to write fast and efficiently. I didn’t know what deadlines were and how serious they were until this class. If you missed one assignment another would be quickly following, and soon you would have five papers to write and they would all be due the next day. I learned this the hard way when I missed doing an assignment and had to stay up all night writing papers. It was hard to adapt to college life but I got the hang of things after a while. I feel very much prepared for college thanks to this course. I learned to manage my time wisely, having to juggle college courses as well as my high school classes. At first I didn’t know if I really wanted to continue my education at a college, I didn’t think I was ready to transition into that life. I still have to improve on things needed to be successful in college, but I believe I have learned enough to make it through the next level. Now I feel well prepped and ready for whatever life throws at

The most difficult part about writing an essay is getting started. Writers block is definitely a writer’s biggest fear. Hours upon hours spent drawing blanks, chewing away at the top of the pencil searching for ideas is certainly common for even the best writers. Even the author of Please Don’t eat the Daisies Jean Keer admits that she feels most inspired when she reads labels.

Coming into college, there was an internally made promise that no opportunity provided would be squandered, that every obstacle, challenge, and struggle would be relentlessly tackled head-on in an attempt to help further develop myself as an individual, and an academic. Though it has been made very apparent through my on-campus engagement that part of the agreement to grow as an individual has been held up, the latter half remains unsatisfactorily unfulfilled. Though there have been many professors to which I hold an abundance of gratitude and praise for their hard work and dedication to teaching students, I have yet to find the truly deep satisfaction of being personally and intellectually challenged by a course.

If I’m to be honest, this school year has been very enjoyable, much more than any of my previous classes. We’ve gone through so much as a class, had many assignments along the way–some that I enjoyed, while others not so much. We rewrote the Declaration of Independence, Walt Whitman 's I Hear America poem, and argumentative essays, like out The Raven analysis. We also gave speeches– that was the hardest for me, in my previous English classes, none of them made me go in front of the class and present–, made infograph, and even a multigenre project. We also can’t forget the books we’ve read in class, like poems from Emily Dickinson, Walt Whitman, Edgar Allan Poe, and novels from F. Scott Fitzgerald, and we can’t forget novella like Of Mice and Men or short stories that we read in our English textbook. All of these things have tested my ability to better improve myself or inform me on where I struggle with so I can improve in many categories such as being a speaker, reader, writer, and listener.

After reviewing all my writings, I felt a sigh of relief. However, not because this course is over, because I feel like I devoted a lot of attention to my writings in this class, and that I put a lot of effort into making sure I thought about the readings deeply, and that I reflected on everything that we did. Overall, I was able to complete all the items on the list, thoroughly, so I think that is something that I should be proud of. I made it through my first semester of college, and was able to complete all my work. The sky is the limit. If I continue with the work ethic that I had for this class, I know that I will be able to be successful in my studies at Salem State University. As longs as I read deeply, think

At the beginning of this semester, in Academic Foundations, I expected to learn about transitioning to college and strategies that would help me succeed throughout college. Transitioning into college required less than what I thought. Getting used to the new environment was not as difficult as I had imagined. I was able to meet new people who are transitioning into college just like me, people of all different backgrounds. I also met many other students who made me realize how fun college could be. In this class, many new techniques that I obtained on how to succeed, include managing my time, new study strategies and many more. This class was not difficult at all, it was easier than I expected, and it definitely taught me a lot about being

I feel very fortunate to have been selected to participate in this program and educational opportunity, in which there were only 15 spots for my high school. Since junior year, I have been taking two classes at the community college, along with my high school classes at Dougherty Valley. This experience is extremely invaluable, and I firmly believe that it is positioning me to succeed in college because now I know how rigorous college courses are. At the start of my first semester in the program, my college freshman English professor proclaimed, “This class will be unlike any high school or college class you have taken. Much of what you learned involves unlearning.” Boy, he was not kidding! After countless sleepless nights and many stressful days, devoting the bulk of my time to reading pages and pages of literature and writing draft after draft of essays, I ultimately figured out what was necessary to succeed in his class. There were many times, when it seemed hopeless, to not only my classmates, but to me. But I would not give up, no matter how hopeless it seemed. To overcome a challenge, is not only about putting in the effort and properly managing the time, but also about asking for help when needed, being curious and engaged, and more importantly, believing that one is capable of overcoming any challenge at which one

When I first started the class I was struggling a lot. Since English is my second language, I had many stressful moments that made me think about dropping my classes. But when I thought about my future, I just kept studying even harder, waiting for my performance to improve. As a result, I felt like every time I wrote an essay, it got easier, which tells me that I’m on the right path. In addition, this class has helped me improve my grammar, taught me an important life lesson about sticking on my goal and helped me to enhance my computer skills

This course like my entire first semester of university have provided me with both many challenges as well as taught me many lessons not only for my university career, but for the rest of my life. As I reflect back on the semester, I recall telling myself at least once a week that I wanted to drop out of school, followed by many breakdowns, crying fits and calling defeat. The past few months, haven’t been at all easy for me, I have thought many times I wasn’t intelligent enough to be in university, I was disappointed with some of the grades I received and I was constantly engulfed in a swarm of stress. Despite all these tough times, I have had many good one’s as well, I have made new friends which are now integral to my everyday life and I have enhanced my knowledge to a new degree. Some of the many lessons that I’ve already learned in my short university experience include how to manage my time, the importance of meeting deadlines as well as the continuous struggle of balancing the various different facets of life.

Sitting in class for the first time, it was half of what I expected. I expected to sit by people I didn’t know, learn about old things in new lights, and writing a lot of papers. What I didn’t expect was me hating college. I am not as creative as some teaches would like, but that isn’t my personality, and I dint want it to be either. I fully expected college to try and morph me into a perfect little student that I knew I wasn’t. College so far to me hasn’t been fun and I will treat it like Wal-Mart. When I say that, I mean that I will get in and get out as fast as possible. If I pick up stuff along the way then alright, but if I don’t, then it won’t kill me.