Sunday, September 30, 2007

Ready for Week Two

My first week back in school was a very pleasant one. It was nice to see all my friends back in class, and got to know my new professors. At the beginning of the week I got to know some new freshmen which were very friendly and nice to talk to. They seemed to be very determined and motivated to be in college.

In my World Cultures class we have a discussion board we have to go to for an assignment but I am having some problems with it. For some reason in my discussion board, there are no discussions going on. This confused me and made me worried at the same time, so I sent an e-mail to the professor so that she could possibly help me out. I’m worried because I got an e-mail from the professor today that I have not yet logged into the discussion board, and that this discussion is part of my participation grade worth 15 points for the week. That’s a lot of points that I don’t want to lose!

This week coming up is going to be busy. Alex (International Business Club Vice President) is going to attend the club convention and run it since I will be unable to make it. It’s going to be hard running the club through someone else, but I’m sure we can do it with great teamwork. I sent her all the information such as brochures and sign in sheets through e-mail so that she can use it during the club convention.

Thursday, September 27, 2007

Favorites

I have now had all my new classes for the quarter and I really enjoyed all of them. My professors are very upbeat and pleasant to talk to. The class I have found most interesting so far is Market Research. The professor is very pleasant and I love how she made herself so available to us. For example, she gave us her house number so that we can reach her at any time! She is very flexible and understanding when it comes to the grading policy and attendance. If we have an emergency and we call her before class to tell her we cannot attend, it will be considered an excused absence as long as it is a valid reason. At the end of the quarter our grade is considered a test grade for attendance.

I still have to buy my books for this quarter. I hate buying books because they’re so expensive but that’s just the reality of going to college, it’s expensive! I noticed that some students have posted around the school the books they have available. I wish Berkeley College had a billboard that was meant just for book posts so that they would all be in one spot instead of posted in the halls, bathrooms, classrooms etc. If all the listings were in one place, it would be easy to find and convenient for everyone.

Tuesday, September 25, 2007

Back We Go

Vacation time is over, and it’s time to get my butt back to school! Vacation was nice but way too short. Yesterday I went to school so that I can help out Berkeley College staff with the Freshman Orientation. It was a lot of fun and I’m glad I volunteered.

At first we did a small orientation for the volunteers so that we knew what we were doing and what games we should play as ice breakers. When it was time for the orientation to begin we had several speakers to address the new students. After the speakers opened, the big group got split into two. One group went inside and learned about Blackboard and the second half stayed with us and played games.

My favorite game to play was the Toilet Paper game because it really allowed students to let loose and express themselves. The game starts off with the premise that everyone is living together for a week and each person is to take as much sheets of TP from one shared roll they would need for that week. After each person takes the amount they need, everyone has to share some information about themselves for each sheet of TP that they took. The game was very fun and allowed people to learn about one another, I wish that we had more time for games.

After the games we had lunch which was really good! There were salads, stuffed shells, pasta, subs, drinks and much more. After lunch, the students were allowed to leave and a second session of orientation began. I had to leave for work so I could not stay for the second session, but I did get a free T-Shirt!

Today is going to be my first class. I’m excited because the class sounds interesting. I hope that the professor can make the class interesting for us as well. When I went through my schedule I noticed that two of the professors I’ve had before are going to be my professors this quarter.

I went to the career services link today to see what they have available. I like that Berkeley gives you easy access to different job openings in case you want to find a part time job. One thing I wish they would do is either date the posts of positions or remove ads that are no longer valid. I’ve called a place once just to find out that the job has been expired for a long time and the position has been filled months ago. I felt a little embarrassed calling them and finding that out.

Tuesday, September 11, 2007

Busy Bee

It has been so long since I have kept everyone updated. I have been so busy between exams and getting my work done that it has been really hard to sit down and write something. This week is finals week and as of today I am done with all my classes. It looks like I am going to get an A in all my classes. This makes me very happy because it’s going to positively reflect in my GPA. Today was my last presentation which was also considered my final. We had to pretend to open a company that supplies vending machines and our job was to use Excel, Power Point, and Word to convince the professor to use our company for her place of business. The task was pretty fun considering I did it at the last minute.

I have been contacting Rowan University about graduate school with some of my concerns that I had with Berkley College. One of my concerns was that Berkeley College goes by the quarter system and not semesters. My second concern was that when graduating Berkeley the summer quarter ends in the middle of September but schools with the semester system start at the end of August. When I got an e-mail back from the school they made me aware that this is not going to be a problem and I can still start graduate school in the fall if I can show that I will be able to provide a diploma at the end of the quarter. This made me really happy.

I sold my books today which made me a little depressed and happy at the same time. Depressed because I spent about $400 on all my books but only got about $90 back and happy because now I’m $90 richer! I have debated buying and selling online but the effort and costs of selling online isn’t worth the price for me. IN addition to that if you buy your book online you then can’t sell it back to the school, you have to go through the effort of finding your own ways of selling it back. I wish we had some student billboard where students could post what books they have to offer and those that they need to buy. This would provide an easy way of communicating with other students about what they have and need.