Monday, June 30, 2008

Vacation!

Vacation time is great! I just got back from Lake George, NY and I had a wonderful time camping. We went for a whole week which was slowly getting to be too much but it was just about perfect timing when it was time to come home. I love camping because you really get to relax and rest. When you go to places where you explore a lot you don’t really get to relax because you end up doing more walking and work than any other day. It’s still fun but not relaxing.

We were able to do quite a lot while camping. We visited Fort William Henry where we learned how to shoot a cannon and how to make lead bullets. Every night we went out for ice cream and dinner which was really nice. We got a great deal when we went on a dinner cruise because it was the boats 100th birthday. For a trip AND a buffet meal we paid $10! The resort that I stayed at was very nice and I even ran into another Berkeley student! It was really fun.

In my last blog I wrote about my grade being 89.36 which made me wonder if it would be rounded off. Well I e-mailed the professor and she told me no. She said that there has to be a cut off line somewhere and my grade will not be rounded. It made me sad that I was so close but I got all A’s in my other classes so it still made my GPA pretty high. Many times students try to be argumentative with professors but I like to see the point of view from both sides. I understand what she means and I understand her view.

Thursday, June 19, 2008

Hope for Understanding

Its only 3:30 and I am patiently awaiting my last final exam today. Most of the class took their final yesterday but because I was unable to make it that day the professor and I made special arrangements to meet today. The professor was very nice and understanding. Since what I was doing was very important he didn’t have a problem with me moving the final. I spoke to him after class and we made the arrangement to meet today.

Berkeley College professors are usually very understanding. This is great because I’m having an issue with my Changing Families class. Our professor has posted our grades and I saw that my final grade came out to being 89.36! I sent her an e-mail if she knows if the grade will get rounded up to an A or if it will stay a B. I also asked her if it was to stay a B if I could do some type of extra credit to bring the grade up .64 points. I will feel so ridicules if I was so close to an A but it’s unable to be rounded. If this happens I will have all A’s in my classes. It’s a great accomplishment. She has not responded to me yet, but I am waiting patiently.

For SGA next quarter we are having some issues making a time for a meeting. Everyone has such a different schedule and nobody can just drop their jobs or other responsibilities. This is mine and Ale’s last quarter and our schedules are more packed than ever. We all need to work to support ourselves with the HIGH gas prices on top of our other expenses. We have not decided on a time or place yet but I hope we come to a decision soon.

Tuesday, June 17, 2008

Survey's

With the end of the quarter comes a bunch of surveys. You have your class surveys to see how well the professor did teaching the class and then when you’re doing your internship you have your internship and Career Services survey. In this internship surveys you are asked what you think of Career Services and how they helped you in your journey through finding and participating in an internship as well as how they helped you in job search.

I liked that the survey was done to see our opinions but some questions don’t really apply with no option to say Not Applicable. My problem was that some questions asked how well Career Services assisted in helping me find a job. I have not searched for a job yet so I cannot really judge as to how well they did. I didn’t have an option to pick that it did not apply so I just chose the middle answer to be neutral. I know if I was having an issue with it other students did as well. Since many people answered differently with no experience I’m sure that somewhat altered the true results of how well Career Services has done its job. Sometimes things that are so simple are so easy to overlook.

Next quarter I am going to push for Student Development having a mandatory survey for students so that we can see their opinions on Student Development and different activities. College is no longer only about the education, but also about the experience and the people you get to meet. We want to provide the best experience to students but without knowing what they want it’s very hard to aim. We already know what students want that attend our events but there are still hundreds of students who do not. If we don’t hear what they have to say it’s very hard to know what to do in order to satisfy them. We can play around with ideas and see what works and doesn’t work but if an event is unsuccessful it’s a waste of money for Student Development. I will have to talk to the Dean about my idea and see how he feels about the idea.

Friday, June 13, 2008

Finals Are Here!

Finals have been taking up so much of time I have not had a chance to write. Today is already Friday and we only have until the end of tomorrow to submit all our work. Lucky for me I was able to get everything done and today I finished my last online test for my Changing Family class. I submitted one of my written paper finals on Tuesday and I had my grade back already the next day for my Race, Gender and Sex class. Luck for me I got a 90 on that final!

I still have a final to take for my advanced spreadsheets class but that’s not until next Thursday. Most of the class took the final yesterday but I was taking my US citizenship test so I wasn’t able to make it to class. The professor and I made special arrangements to take my test because this was very important to me. Lucky for me I passed my test with flying colors and now I am officially a US citizen. Yayyy!!!

This Thursday we had Chillax Day during the activity period like we did last quarter but this time it was a flop. The masseuse that normally comes never got back to us, we had no music, no mocktails (fake cocktails), and not that many people showed up. I’m not really sure why we were so unprepared, but we did serve ice cream for that hour. That was our last activity period for this quarter. We never have anything going on for the last week because its finals week and most people are studying. We also didn’t have a meeting this Thursday because I was unable to make it due to my test. We all hope to have a wonderful break and hope to see many new faces in the summer time!

Tuesday, June 10, 2008

No Resume Skills :-(

I need a break! Not only is it 100 degrees outside (literally), but I have two 5-6 page papers due this week! This is the last week of classes so everyone is cramming last minute homework in. I have just finished one of my papers for my internship class. Our last assignment was to write at least 5 pages on the strategic analysis of our internship company. This included the internal and external analysis of the company. It took me about 3 hours but I finally got it done. It’s not yet edited but it’s done! I had to go take a pool break because I was dying from the heat!

So on another note, you will not believe this. I have a friend who recently graduated Rutgers University in the Criminal Justice major. He was never too fond of the school because it’s was big, crowded and no personal attention. There was no surprise to me there since it’s a big university but get this, he has NO IDEA on how to make a resume. I was appalled! How can you graduate college and not know how to make a resume?!?!

Berkeley offers so much help in this department that you cannot go wrong. You take a Microsoft Word class when you enter college that teaches you about resume’s, then you take your placement seminar before your internship that teaches you how to make a resume, cover letter, thank you letter etc, and if you still failed to pay attention to class you can always go to the Career Center and they will help you make one with you. I decided to help my friend write his resume and he was able to submit it today. I felt proud of myself and the knowledge that I have thanks to Berkeley but it’s scary students are graduating college and don’t know how to write a resume.

Thursday, June 5, 2008

Strategic Planning Meeting

Today was the Strategic Planning Meeting at the GMT campus. The meeting started at 12:15 with a lovely lunch. We then moved on to discussing the current plan and then talked about suggestions for the new plan. I was amazed at how detailed everything was and how interesting the plan was. Everyone was very professional and suggested great ideas on how to make the students happy.

One of the great suggestions I was really impressed by is how their planning on having classes where it will be held half on campus and half online. This is a great solution to a large increase in students wanting to take online classes because of the rise in gas prices. With these classes you can have the freedom to do class work at your own time but also have the attention of a in class professor. I love the idea!

Another thing I tried to accomplish today was to get packages for the summer. There were a lot of lines around 5pm when I went there and I knew it would take a while. I came back closer to six but the line was still pretty long. I waited around for a bit and then had to go to class and I wasn’t able to make it. My class ended at 8pm since it’s only a 2 hour class so I figured why not go get it done now since it’s still early.

I got to the financial aid but Mr. Perez, S is a Financial Aid Administrator told me that they weren’t taking anymore students today. I mentioned to him that I will not be on campus until next Wednesday and I really need to pay my bill. Mr. Perez, S then told me to call tomorrow and they can do it over the phone. This was very relieving knowing I don’t have to wait until the last minute to pay my bill. When you have something outstanding with Student Accounts or Financial Aid you get a pop up on Blackboard every time you log in that remind you of it. It’s a great reminder but I was getting quite tired of it! I will call tomorrow and get packaged asap!

Wednesday, June 4, 2008

Fatty Day of Ice Cream!

Wow, talk about today being a fatty day! Today we had our “Get the SCOOP from SGA Day”. It wasn’t a nice weather inside but we made the best of it inside. We had students show up as well some professors. In total we had about 50 people sign up. This is a pretty good amounting considering we also have about 45 people signed up for the SGA Facebook. We have really grown this quarter!

So I got to school at about 10:30 and helped prepare things. We had so many things to offer to students. We had Galati ice cream, cookie dough, chocolate mint, chocolate, vanilla, strawberry, rainbow sprinkles, chocolate sprinkles, cherries, whipped cream, chocolate syrup, caramel syrup, pretzels, cones, and the list goes on. Every SGA member got to keep an ice cream scoop and a bowl. It was such a nice gesture of Ms. Young to do for all the SGA members. Students were having such a good time that some of them even started making ice cream faces. This is by far my favorite one made my Danni

Photobucket

So as usual, check out the pictures of our fatty day!


Tuesday, June 3, 2008

Survey Time!

As I have been mentioning the end of the quarter is coming and everyone is trying to get everything done. Today I had some time so I took all my course surveys. At the end of each quarter Berkeley asks students questions about their course and the professor. Not only do we get a grade but so does the professor! This ensures students that they are getting the best professors and that they are getting a good education. These are some of the survey questions that we rate for the professor:

How was the timeliness of a professor’s response?
Was the course was at an appropriate level?
Did the professor listen to student’s questions and opinions?
How well did this course fit into the requirement?
Was this course challenging enough?
Was the grading explained effectively?
Were the class requirement explained effectively?
Free window to write any suggestions and opinions

I really love that Berkeley does this. I did not have any complaints about any of my courses just some suggestions. I suggested that for the internship course maybe we should be allowed to upload our weekly journal entrees once a week instead of saving them all for the end. It would be much more efficient and make it less of a burden at the end when everyone has many other finals to worry about. Listening to students is very important because the school exists for them. In a big college your voice barely gets heard.

Monday, June 2, 2008

Its Monday!

It’s Monday night and I’m already feeling extra tired! Every Monday night I have a routine of posting all my first discussion board posts. The rule is that you have to make your initial post by Wednesday and then you need 2 more to your classmate’s responses by the end of the week. I really like this system. It helps many students communicate and speak their mind.

The time crush is slowing beginning. There are only 2 weeks of school left and final papers are rolling in. I already have 2 new assignment assigned on top of other things I have to do for my internship. I have so many things going on this week too. On Thursday I have a meeting with the Strategic Planning Committee to discuss Berkeley Strategic Plan. I have several things I would like to discuss with them. I like that I have a voice as to what is going on around the school. The meeting was originally going to take place at one of the New York Campus. It got moved about a week ago to the Garret Mountain campus which is much more convenient for me. I was definitely not going to make it to the NY campus, but now I can be right in the action. We even get lunch!

SGA has been doing better than ever. As I mentioned before we will soon be launching an online Berkeley Blackboard version of SGA and we already got 30 people to sign up! We got them to sign up by telling them that if they print out the welcome page they will get free ice cream on Wednesday. What better way to bribe people than with ice cream! Facebook SGA has been going great as well. We have over 45 members which was very challenging. It’s growing, getting strong and more fun than ever. I hope it continues to do so after I graduate.