Reflection Paper

When I first decided to expand my education, it had been so long since I had been to school, and I was very hesitant. I talked at length about my decision with my husband and with his encouragement, decided to enroll but still was not quite sure which degree program to enroll in. I knew that this was something that I had always wanted to do since I obtained my Associates Degree in Nursing, but I did not have the courage, nor did I want to give up the time with my family and children. I second guessed my abilities and my knowledge because it had been so long since I had been in college. Now that my children are about to graduate high school and

However, when it comes to getting any type of paper work done “I’m Black”. When I’m filling out job applications “I’m White”. When it comes to having a good reputation about anything “I’m White”. When it comes to singing or dancing “I’m Black” because I have “soul”. Because I am mixed, I can use my background to my advantage to get things across or make a point.

Throughout the course of this semester, I have continuously grown as a writer. Prior to taking this course, I had little experience or knowledge when it came to writing. I used to struggle with forming my thoughts into writing, let alone a paper. I was never confident with what I wrote. My writing had no greater purpose other than the assignment. My writing process included: writing my paper, proofreading it, and turning it in. Once the paper left my hands, it also left my mind. Throughout this course we worked with others, visited the writing lab, wrote critiques, and we were able to revise our papers. I believe that all of this is has caused me to grow greatly as a writer.

When I entered into high school nearly four years ago, my motivations were purely academic. I was there to get the best education I could, and to maintain a standard of scholastic excellence. Of course, the only way I knew to measure my own “success” was through concrete and quantitative means; this led me to spend my Freshman and Sophomore years fawning over test scores, GPA points, and even fractions of percents in my grades. I know now that this strategy, while effective in getting me what I wanted (or at least thought I wanted), actually left me missing a huge part of what it means to be truly educated.

81% of Black adults reported that they have experienced at least one incident of day-to-day discrimination. And Adolescence is a stage in which to examine the impact of racial discrimination on the psychological part of African Americans (Racial Identity Matters). Which can cause a person to be scared expectably if someone has already confined in themselves of their race. "My siblings had already instilled the notion of black pride in me. I would have preferred that Mommy were black. Now, as a grown man, I feel privileged to have come from two worlds" (McBride 103). It was easier to accept the black

Being black has affected my life in many different ways. I did not know what racism was until I moved to the United States. It was through the media, society views and the many images that are being displayed, is when I realized that my life was going to be hard. While I do not have the same struggle as black men, I do of course have these stereotypes placed on me. Black women are projected as angry, gold diggers, hypersexual. Those labels do not define who I am and what I am but regardless how I feel, society has already made up their mind about me without even realizing that these images are affecting my outlook on life.

My race is black. I feel like I always be constrained due to my race. I’m proud to be black and love that im black. Being blacks haves it benefits. Thought out history we is as being strong and can get thought a lot of things. A lot of people doubt us but us proving them wrong. Black people are making history in many different ways, ways that you never thought would happened. We our getting degrees. We our becoming presidents. Building and owning our own business. We doing thing that people thought we wouldn’t do. The only thing about my race is that a lot of us our getting killed by cops. They say it not a race thing but to me it is. Every day you see an example of this on the news. A white person kill cop or just people. They just get handcuff

Growing up in the rural town of Browns Mills, being a Black girl was like a dime a dozen; it held no signifying factors for me. Whether you were White, Black, Spanish, or any other group, the people I grew up with accepted everyone despite it. Such acceptance while enjoyable, did not fortify me for the later struggles I would confront after leaving the socially idyllic neighborhood. Since my town was accepting of everyone there was never a need to learn about or claim aspects of my diversity. My biggest personal claim to diversity in my childhood was the being great (many times over) granddaughter of to a Seminole Chief. Even this story, passed down through my family, was hard to prove. I had a disinterest in carrying over my families

I always wondered if I was Black enough. My hair is kinky, curly and sticks up in all directions when I wake up. My skin is a warm, tawny brown with undertones of orange, which compliment my chestnut brown eyes. I kept especially educated on the oppression of Black people and the continuous history that seems to be perpetual . The most obvious point, my mother is African-American. Yet, because of my White father, I am considered almost everything but Black.

This is the experience for the majority of people who are not white. In this type of experience people are very aware of the impact that race is having on them in their lives and it is mostly negative. This type of experience is reinforced through clear racial equalities seen in life and in the media. One example of this that has received attention recently is the difference in how different races are treated by law enforcement officers. After seeing and experiencing abuses by the system it is difficult not to become increasingly conscious of race as an important factor in life. In this category race is experienced in a much more active sense as it is seen to effect everything around a person. Under this category of experience, it becomes very easy to see that there is an advantaged and a disadvantaged group in this country and that race is a key determining factor.

An individual’s race could affect their access to wealth, power, and prestige. Their race could limit or increase their access to education, housing and other valued resources. As an African American woman I feel my race plays apart in who I am today. Growing up I was limited to the information I needed to better myself in the educational setting, but my mother understood how education could change my life for the better. With my mother having an understanding of what was needed to make a change in your life as well as mine, she pushed for change in the school system in our community. Even though I was a part of the African American community, other African American women felt I did not belong. This is because my skin was lighter than the other African American females in my community.

On December 5th, I, along with Nicholas Vigilante and Tessa Bloomer, led the final recitation for our section. The friday before we were to lead the class, we met in Van Pelt library to discuss our lesson plan, included in the final page of the PDF. Our discussion was very focused and organized, and it did not take us too much time to agree on what was most important to cover for our lesson. Because it was required for us to allot some time to review each other’s final projects, we decided to do so in the beginning of the class. Nicholas pointed out that it would be worth it to talk about the UN Sustainability Goals mentioned in class, so we decided to spend the next section of class discussing how those related to our peers’ majors. Afterwards, I thought it would be prudent to have a discussion on the United States’ decision to drop out of the Paris Climate Accords, given how it connect to the unit’s material and the potential ramifications the decision has on our future as humans. As a whole, we decided to look at one more case study, the Bhopal disaster, and then transition that into a discussion of the readings.

. We felt uncomfortable because we were alone and knew that behind our back people were thinking, “Who are these maniacs that are washing so strangely?” I couldn’t wait to leave the bathroom, so I quickly finished washing and waited for my three other friends to finish. Then the hard part came. All of us girls would have to pray in front of everyone alone. So I called my dad and said “Baba, we need to pray, do you know any safe place for us at the mall?” He told me to pray in the Arcade room because it would be full of people and if anything bad would happen we would be safe with a group of people. In my head, I knew that’s the place all the kids and families would be. I honestly was afraid that something bad would happen and started happing these thoughts: I could go and lie to my friends and say there is no place to pray or to not pray at all. But I knew I had to pray, so I pushed all those sneaky thoughts away and took all my friends to the arcade room. As we entered the arcade room, it was full of kids laughing, screaming, running around and playing with all the games that were as colorful as a rainbow. We decided to go pray in the back because not many people sit there. As we prayed, one kid stared at us for a while. I thought he must have been thinking, “Who are these crazy people bowing to an arcade game?” I couldn’t stand it any longer. We were almost done and I thought nothing bad would happen, little did I know the hate was on its way. We were on the third

Throughout most of my life, I can say that I always thought of myself as equal as everyone else. I never thought of myself as special as any other person in the world and I was alright with that. When I was a kid, I was too oblivious to figure out what racism was and how that had an effect on how others perceived me. I usually had no problem talking with anyone I found worth talking to because I didn’t care about their ethnicity or background or how they looked. Honesty I would say that I am fortunate enough to live in a time where being black is culturally accepted in the states. I had some clue that the color of my skin was somewhat looked down upon, but because I was naive, I didn’t care about what color I was. This may sound peculiar,

Everyday race is in my social life. I myself make certain choices based on my racial characteristics. When I was first put into a school, my classmates are all of the same race as me. At first I had no idea what race even was. Eventually, the more levels that I would move up in school, I started to realize that there were people of different color. I didn't want to friends with those people of different color. It sounds bad, but it's the truth. I was still young and I only wanted to be with people that looked like me. It wasn’t until around middle school I realized everybody is the created equal. By then I believed it was too late. I already had white friends and only white friends and I didn't think I had any chance of having a