Personal Narrative: My Experience With The Liberal Youth Ambassador Student

A great impact that I witnessed that year is when I took the school field trip to numerous colleges close to the city. I had never been to a university or even a community college. Therefore, me going to those visit gave me a greater idea on what type of college I'd like to attend. One of the colleges I remembered we toured to was Lakeland Community College. I really liked the aspects that it has, with the classrooms even the on campus living. Taking trip like that sets your mind up but also prepares you to know what to expect and look for when you are college searching.

I am a native San Antonian, born and raised here, but also very proud of my Mexican roots since i do have dual citizenship of the United States and Mexico. When i turned 10, my parents believed i would benefit from dual citizenship, since they were born there. I am a now upcoming senior of Southwest High School, class of 2016. On my last year of grade school, it has been very challenging with the question, "So, what's your plan for after high school?" It's so scary becuase you have so many options, there is the military, work force and of course to coutinue your education: college. But in order to make a desision you have to have a base of what you plan to do, throughout all my time in school i have tried to involve myself in anything possible

As a first generation, Mexican-American student who is proud of being involved in both Greek life and the Theatre community on campus, I believe that I have a very unique position as a member of the Cornell community. As a first generation, Mexican American student I know the struggles that come with navigating the college process and all the obstacles that come with it. I can empathize with others who might be facing the same struggles and I enjoy being as helpful as possible, so that others can avoid some of the road blocks that I faced during the college search process. As a member of the Greek community, I understand the importance of philanthropy and building a network with other diverse minds. Through this community I have come to value

Alfreda was a first generation college student. She had a difficult academic experience being one of only four African American students majoring in animal science. She used her social life to help her cope with the experience. Alfreda mentioned Zinck 's night which is a campus tradition named after a bar keeper in Ithaca that owned a bar that was a haven for college students. Alfreda found no interest in this event, however, she did participate in Slope day because it was an opportunity for her and her friends to celebrate the last day of school. Instead of participating in the university-wide homecoming, she mentions a separate homecoming sponsored by a Black fraternity, Alpha Phi Alpha and the Festival of Black Gospel. She states:

Coming into the University I didn’t know what to expect, especially with taking 16 hours, and Comp being one of them. Being a first generation college student, has been rough especially since my older sister exceeded my parents expectations. I believe I am capable of succeeding in anything I set my mind to. I have always struggled with English/Writing since English is my second language. Many people tend to get surprised when I tell them I learned English at the age of 4, since they believed English would be my first language since I was born in the United States. Long story short, English is my second language because I was raised by my grandparents, since my parents always dedicated their time to work to provide us with a better future.

Growing up as a first-generation college-bound Hispanic woman has proven to be a difficult journey. Both of my parents left their home countries at a young age and came to this country without any ideas or real opportunities on where to begin. At a young age, I have been taught that having a higher education is the key to having a successful and plentiful life. However, the journey towards achieving my dream of receiving a higher education has been filled with moments where I have challenged the stereotypes about getting pregnant and dropping out of high school, facing my grandma’s unexpected illness that affected me both academically and mentally, and the challenge of being a first generation college bound student in my family.

Serving others by utilizing the lessons I have learned through my experiences and my talents is how I want to live my life. As a first generation college student, I want to integrate myself in programs or start my own mentorship program where I am able to mentor and give back to students who are first generation college students as well. I feel it’s important to reach out to first generation college students because the amount of pressure we receive with little to no guidance can be discouraging and lead us to feel alone in this process.

Being a leader has always been extremely important to me. The past few years I have held many leadership positions to deepen my skills as a leader. Some of my most notable leadership positions of high school were that I was the secretary of my class, the secretary of my school’s National Honor Society, a member of the Youth Council for the Teen Leadership Corps, and a Student Ambassador for my high school. I have recently been chosen as a Peer Leader for the College of Business Administration (CBA), meaning that I will be available to help incoming freshman with whatever they may need as they make the transition to college. I was also chosen by the dean to give a speech at one of the largest high school visits for the CBA in order to inspire students to choose to come to Bowling Green. This was a very important experience for me because I had many high school seniors come up to me after the speech and ask me questions and reached out for advice from me. It is important to me that people value my advice because I believe that giving good advice is an imperative part of being a leader.

they believe their application would be incomplete without it. If this sounds like you, then please

I was able to become a student senator and contribute to the Washburn Student Government Association. I was placed in an internship in the Kansas House Minority Leaders office for 8 months, helping with constituent service and developing a community mentorship program with legislators from both parties. I participated in four Washburn Transformational Experience programs which allowed me to study culture and economics in Japan and Korea, Politics in the United Kingdom, and follow presidential candidates in Iowa. I volunteered on a student voter registration drive led by the Kansas League of Women Voters. All while maintaining a 3.7 GPA in Washburn’s rigorous political science

I decided to review an article by Martha J. Strickland titled, Storylines: Listening to Immigrant Students, Teachers, and Cultural-Bridge Persons Making Sense of Classroom Interactions. I found the article in National University’s library. This article describes a study in which “storylines” is used to capture and analyze how newly arrived immigrant students in U. S. classrooms make meaning of lessons with limited English and how their teachers, without prior experience with the cultures of these students, manage to educate them. Pursuing understanding (knowledge construction) of academic content is a multicultural education dimension.

Last year I took a few classes at Columbus State Community College. There were definitely some changes that I had to make so my life could still run smoothly. Some of the things that changed were my extracurricular activities. I had to swim less often than before because I had classes or homework that I needed to do. My study habits didn’t change very much, surprisingly. I still did my work sooner instead of later. I won’t say I always did it as soon as I could because while that would have been optimal it didn’t always work out. And I made sure I always got the work that was due first, done first. Also during the school year my classes at Columbus State were on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday. In addition to those I still had all

While attending Judson High School in the beginning of my senior year, our advisory teacher Mrs. Evans

In June of 2015, I attended the Hugh O’Brian Youth Leadership Seminar – North Florida – at Florida State University in Tallahassee, Florida. The four days I spent at that seminar were some of the most defining moments of my adolescent life. The Hugh O’Brian Youth Leadership Seminar, or HOBY, provides an opportunity for youth leaders to build their leadership skills in an open and accepting environment while tackling taboo topics such as climate change, terrorism, pollution, and racial profiling. The seminar is the reason why I have taken up such a distinct passion for youth leadership as well as the belief that leadership development in our youth is one of the most important of the diverse methods to building a brighter future. Therefore, for my service project I helped put together the 2016 Hugh O’Brian Youth Leadership Seminar at Florida State University and served on staff to ensure the same opportunity that I had just a year ago was provided to the new ambassadors. This 2016 HOBY seminar spanned from Wednesday, June 1st, 2016 to Sunday, June 5th, 2016 – well surpassing the time requirement for this service project.

I walked into the student center at Rio Salado College and spoke with an advisor who told me I needed to take philosophy class to finish my degree. I had two questions pop into my head at that moment. One was why do I need this class to help me with my career path. Secondly what is philosophy and I hope it does not contain much writing. He told me philosophy is just like your first question, he further explained philosophy is when you dig deeper into the reasoning behind why we do what we do. I sat there for a minute intrigued, because I catch myself wondering why I do a lot of things I do. I was so caught on what this class may have to offer that I did not realize he skipped over my second question about there being a lot of writing involved.