Site Visit

I am so excited to get started with this mentoring program! Honestly, at first I was truly dreading it. I did not think I would be willing to get involved and consider it a fun experience. I thought it was just going to be another burden to add to my week, but I have already been mistaken.
When I visited the site a few days ago, I became inspired. The thing I am most interested in is meeting my kid. I really hope we have a lot in common, because I think if we did, that would be so much fun for both me and him. If we do not connect though, that might make this experience a bit sour. That is honestly the only thing I am worried about at this point. I just hope that no social issues or frustrating situations come up, because I want him to benefit from this opportunity.
I hope to gain a true friendship with my mentee as well as an understanding of the mentoring process. I hope to become a role model as well as a guide for this kid as he or she goes through the 6th grade, because that is a tough year to be going through all by yourself. I cant wait to get started!

Dr. Hickey!

I thought that Doctor Hickey's presentation to our class was great. He truly described the duties of a Capstone Scholar in great detail, and it really opened my eyes to what I need to accomplish this semester and year.
My experience so far has been great as well. I love being included in exclusive stuff going on on campus that I would not have known about if I was not a Capstone Scholar. It obviously opens up many more opportunities both academically and socially.
I honestly did not think my experience was going to be this time-consuming, but I mean that in a good way. I always find myself so busy with Capstone activities, sorority functions, and schoolwork. It has been so much fun to always be on-the-go, and time is flying by so fast! College is definitely not what I expected- it's way more fun!

GOALS :)

As far as a Student Engagement Plan goes, I will definitely strive to get all A's for my freshman semesters, join and stick with a club or an organization, and sky dive.
I personally think that joining a club and sticking with it will be the easiest goal of mine to achieve. It just takes a little bit of time and commitment, which shouldn't be too difficult to accomplish. I just need to find something that I am interested in deeply enough to set aside a bit of my life for it, but it is really important to me that I get involved.
Earning all A's will definitely be the hardest goal for me to reach. I am just such a procrastinator, and that definitely will not allow me to receive A's these first two semesters. I am an intelligent person overall, but I definitely need to work on my organizing skills in order to live up to my full potential. So this goal is definitely reachable, but it will just take a little more work for me at this point in my academic life.
I seriously want to go sky diving. I have wanted to for so, so long, and USC is the perfect place to do it because we have that sky diving club. I just simply need to take the steps to get involved and in the club!

LASSI Results

I personally was really disappointed with my LASSI scores. I basically scored between the 0-50% range for everything except 3 items. Some of the ones I disagreed with the most were the one about motivation and understanding material. My results showed that I am not motivated to do well in school, which, in fact, is the exact opposite of my true attitude. The reason I am here is to do well in school, so I don't really get it honestly. The scores also showed that I cannot adequately understand material given to me in certain forms. Even if I do struggle at first with specific assignments, I always go over them until I get it. I don't really know, those two just really got under my skin for some reason.
I did agree with the fact that I have a hard time with time-management skills. For example, I have waited until the final night to do this blog assignment, ha ha. I just need to learn how to organize my studies in a better fashion than I did in high school, because I know my previous methods will not exactly cut it in college.

Sevice Learning

In my opinion, service learning is a weird way to put this type of experience. To me, it's simply volunteering to do something beneficial in your community. I have been involved in these type of activities...mainly through my church. We would always go to a Habitat for Humanity function, operation: christmas child event, or north fulton charities auctions.
My personal favorite was Operation: Christmas Child. What it would consist of was our youth group wrapping up small toys and sending them in fun packaging across the world to those young kids who never are used to getting holiday gifts. It was so fufilling in the end.
If I could chose to do any type of service learning project, I would definitely do anything related to children in need. I love the feeling of helping out kids in tough situations, from reading to just simply caring for them.

Labor Day Weekend

This Labor Day weekend was seriously so much fun!! I just pledged Kappa Delta, so we had a new member retreat to Myrtle Beach from Saturday until Monday. I really got to know my fellow pledge girls, and we had a great time relaxing on the beach. The water was surprisingly warm and clear blue!! 

Honestly, I wasn't too excited about going at first. All of my other friends were going to be at home and hanging out together, I felt like I was going to miss out on something, but I am so glad it worked out the way it did! :)

Getting to know the other girls really made me feel like a part of KD, and now I'm, like, obsessed with every single one of them. It was such a great weekend, and I cannot wait until the next function with all of those crazy girls. :)

USC always brags about how they have over 300 clubs and how there are so many opportunities to get involved, blah blah blah....but I didn't realize how true that was!! Seeing all of those organizations in one spot was so cool! Very overwhelming though. I had no idea where to begin my journey through the street, honestly, but i made it through and found some really sweet clubs that I am definitely considering joining. 

If I had to pick JUST two that I was interested in, I would definitely pick the sky diving club and white water rafting club.

Like I really have always wanted to go sky diving, and I know most teenagers say that, but I have wanted to do it since I was like ten. It's so cool that they actually offer that as a club though, cause I have never heard of that before!

The white water rafting club is a bit out of my comfort zone, just because I'm not very outdoors-y, which is why I want to do it! In college I believe that getting involved with something completely new is crucial, cause you figure out more about yourself. I'm so excited to just get started with all of this stuff. :)

Honestly, I think I'm too lazy to start my own club, but if i was motivated enough, I would definitely start some type of music club. I don't really know what we would do, but definitely hang out and play guitar or just listen to music and just chill with people who like the same music as you do. I think that would be so so fun!

So the club fair was an overall success in my opinion. I'm so glad I went and found out about all the things they offer at this awesome school!