Inspire Your Heart With Art Day

About two weeks ago we had an event called "Inspire Your Heart Day" which was organized by the Student Deveopment and SGA. Ms. Young which is the Student Development Director bought all these different frames, door hangers and paint for students to use and decorate their own frame. With Valentines Day coming up, we thought it would be a great idea to have this event so that students can make things for their loved ones.

The event was a hit! We had such a great outcome that not only did students attend, but professors did as well. Even thought activity period only lasted for an hour students stayed after to finish their projects. Here are some pictures from the event taken by Ms. Young.

Internship Interview

There are only about 3 more weeks left in the winter quarter! This creates a big rush for students who need an internship by spring. Some students say they do not have any internships lined up yet and their getting quite worried. I don’t have one yet but I got very lucky!

My professor had a speaker for us in the Placement Seminar class. This woman works for a company that verifies resume information so that employers are well aware of who they are hiring. It’s very easy for people to exaggerate resume credentials, or pretend that they worked where they really didn’t. She was very nice and spoke to us about resume writing, what she looks for in a resume and what catches her eye. Later on she mentioned that her company was looking for a marketing intern which really sparked my attention, so I made certain to get her card before she left.

She mentioned that the position is 25 hours per week, which is perfect for what I need. In order to get the 600 hours of internship experience you need about 25 hours per week for 2 quarters. I later on e-mailed her my resume telling her that I was very interested and I would like to have an opportunity for the position. She e-mailed me back questions that she wanted me to answer and we then set up an interview. We are having a lunch interview this Wednesday at 11:30am. I’m very excited, but also a bit nervous.

In my placement seminar class we have been talking a lot about interviewing techniques and what to do but I realized those are all ways to interview in a traditional formal setting. We have never talked about how to interview over lunch or dinner. I will have to make it a point on Tuesday to speak to the professor and class about this. I think it’s very important for students to know how to interview in various situations. Sometimes you can lose yourself and become way too comfortable by having lunch with someone, but hopefully the professor will be able to give me some good tips to improve my chances and calm my nerves.

Confusion Quickly Figured Out!

It’s already week 8, time is flying by. For my Arts in the Contemporary Society we have a research paper due that I actually found very interesting. At first I was dreading the assignment because it required quite a bit of research, reading, writing, etc. But once I started working on it, I actually enjoyed writing it!

Our assignment is to pick a contemporary artist from a list that was provided to us and write about them, their work, and how we feel about their work. I am a very opinionated person and I love expressing how I feel. This class is definitely for people who have a lot to say about different topics and ideas!

In my New Product Development class we are taking a test this week. It is an online class, so when it’s exam week we only have to worry about the exam and no other work. Normally we have reading, writing and a discussion board to participate on but our professor is nice enough to let us focus on the just the exam without having to do other work around this time. This helps us to not get overwhelmed. On Blackboard he posts a review sheet to give us an overview of what we should concentrate on. This way you don’t have to spend all day reading over all the chapters and can study the important parts instead. I have grown very fond of online classes and I am excited to take more next quarter. This will definitely help me out because I will be busy with my internship.

My friend Ale and I are now both part of the SGA and the International Business Club. The other day we were talking and realized that we have totally different requirements for our Internships but were both studying the same thing. The difference is that she only needs one internship but I need two! I was quite shocked when I found out because I thought that everyone needed to take two internships (600 hours) in order to graduate with a Bachelors Degree. Come to find out it’s because she started in the summer of ‘05 and I started in fall of ’05. The internship requirements changed in the fall, therefore she only needs one. The Berkeley staff was very helpful at explaining this to her. She was really worried that she would have to attend an extra quarter just to fulfill the requirements. In a way I’m glad I have to take two internships. This way I get more exposure to the business world, and get more of an idea of what the marketing working environment is like.

2008 Leadership Retreat in Princeton, New Jersey Pictures

Bad Weather Never Ends!

This week went by so fast and it seemed like everyone was so busy! Tuesday afternoon into the evening we had a large storm come through the area. It started off as rain, turned into snow and then more rain which eventually turned into ice by morning. That day I was able to attend the SGA meeting, then waited around for class until 6pm but the weather was getting so bad that I decided to go home instead of staying for my night class and risk the roads getting worse.

I did come to class for about ten minutes but noticed that nobody was there except one person. Our professor was running late so some girl came into the classroom to tell us that our professor is going to be late because of all the traffic. I knew she commutes quite a distance, so who knew what time she was going to arrive. All I could focus on was that I live pretty far myself and should probably leave to get home safely. I left at about 6:10 and the roads were already terrible! Normally it takes me 30 min to get home but that day it took me an hour and ten minutes. The lane markers were all covered in snow and slush so everyone just made their own lanes. If it was this bad at 6pm, I would have hated to drive home at 9:30 when class was normally over.

The next day, our teacher sent us an e-mail that despite the bad weather they still ran the class. She told us that we covered one chapter and it would be in our best interest to read the chapter carefully. This isn’t a problem. I would rather read the chapter on my own than risk driving in that terrible weather late that night.
Everything seems to be zooming by so fast. It’s already almost time to apply for the spring, look for internships and so on. I feel like I just started my journey at Berkley but now it’s only two quarters away from being done! Time sure flies when you’re having fun!

Feeling Accomplished

Great news! Due to the Student Government’s strong commitment and persistent efforts, we have finally gotten the approval to get a new bulletin board in the main building at the Garret Mountain campus. Now Ms. Young has to order the billboard and we have to wait till it goes up. We are all very excited because many other organizations have tried to make this happen before but could not. We will now have one for all the clubs and organizations to use.

For a while we have been trying to come up with a fundraiser that we can organize to raise money for an animal shelter. At first our parking spot raffle got turned down, but we all agreed we should submit a program proposal for a picture contest. We decided to call it the “Pet Picture Contest”. For the contest, students can submit pictures of their pets for a chance to win prizes. For every submission that we get we will charge about $2 so that we can buy products for the animal shelter. The animal shelter I have in mind is the Bloomingdale Animal Shelter, but I will run it by Ms. Young to see if it’s ok. When looking on their website I read that the donations they need are towels, blankets, canned foods, bleach for cleaning, and toys for pets. This project will allow Berkeley students to participate in something good as well as help Berkeley do something for the local community.

Another thing I am working on for Berkeley is to have a guest speaker give a speech during one of our activity periods. Last week I had the pleasure to meet a great motivational speaker. He spoke a lot about leadership and how everyone can be a leader; they just need an opportunity to bring it out in them. When I heard him speak about leadership, I had a flashback of our Leadership Retreat in Princeton, NJ. Since only a selected number of students were able to go to the Leadership Retreat I thought it would be a great idea to invite the speaker to Berkeley to speak to the rest of the student body. I’m still waiting for a response from Student Development to see if we could invite him to speak but I will keep everyone updated on what is happening!

Update on Classes

Classes this quarter are very interesting to me. In my Human Sexuality class we are learning a lot of important information and interesting topics; we just had our midterm the other day. This class is really fun and I would really recommend signing up with Professor Laura Harste. She makes the class really funny and interesting. She applies real life experiences to subject mater taught in class that helps you remember things for the exam.

In my Placement Seminar class we are still learning the major things we need to know for our internship. These include resume writing, interview techniques, professional posture, behavior and how to quote things to make everything sound positive about you. Some of these things I have never known before and I am finding to be very helpful. When I was at the Leadership Retreat someone mentioned that it would be useful if there was a similar class for freshman; I thought that was a great idea. It could be like a seminar on how to make your classes, make resumes and ways to apply for jobs.

We also just had our midterm in Microeconomics. I had the same professor I had for macro that I have for micro. This really helped because macro and micro are so similar it really helps to learn with the same teaching style. Professor Malumba is a great teacher and the way he explains things, I just get it. I think I did pretty well on the exam especially since we got a review sheet the week before with the exact same questions. We were able to even use the notes and notebooks on the exam.

I then have my two online classes Arts in the Contemporary Society and New Product Development. I never thought I would like online classes so much but I really do.
They are very convenient and easy to do once you get the hang of it. When we had the Inspire Your Heart with Art Day event in the student center, My professor from my Arts class was there and I finally got to meet her. Dr. St. John was really nice and friendly. She showed me some of her art work that she has made and explained to me how her art reflects her life. It was very meaningful.

A good mix of online classes and on site classes worked perfectly into my busy schedule. Next quarter I am doing the same thing with only one on site class on Tuesday night. It will work perfect with SGA meetings being on Tuesday and my internship that I will be doing. I can’t wait to start looking for one!

SGA Struggles

SGA has been trying to implement many changes around the campus, and try different ideas but many times our efforts come to a standing halt. It’s been a bit aggravating but we’ll keep trying until some things are done. I never knew how hard it would be to get small changes put into action.

Our main idea that a lot of students are strongly fond of is to get a new bulletin board in the main GMT building by the library. It is currently an empty wall that we could use so that students are more aware about activities that are happening on campus. When different clubs heard about this news they got really excited because they know how hard it is to only be allowed to advertise in the Student Center and on Blackboard. Blackboard advertising is very limited, and only posted by the Student Development Directors. If they are busy, we cannot post an advertisement on Blackboard.

The reason I have been really persistent about this is because it’s a simple thing that could make students very happy. Students post things all around the campus anyway, so we might as well give them a spot to put it. We have a suggestion box which SGA has made and some of the comments we have received is that we should have more activities. The ironic thing is that we do have a good number of activities; it’s just that many students are not aware of them. Unless commuting students have to buy books, they never go into the student center. We have been working on this for 5 weeks now, and I hope that we can make this change happen soon. We have a great support behind us from Berkeley to help us.

Another bit of news with regard to SGA is that we are looking for a new Vice President! Ms. Young made an ad on Blackboard about the position and there seems to be a lot of people interested. She told me that just the first day about 7 people showed interest. It takes a lot of time, dedication, and motivation to make a good VP for SGA. I hope that we can find a good candidate.

Leadership Retreat 2008

Today we returned from the 2008 Leadership Retreat, and it was a great time just like last year. This year we went to Princeton, NJ and stayed at the Westin Hotel. We left the Garret Mountain campus around 1:30pm and arrived about 2:30ish. As soon as we entered, we were astonished to see how beautiful the hotel was. While on the bus we got our keys and proceeded to our rooms. This year, I was happy to see that we got to room with people from our own campus instead of people from other campuses. Even thought that was a good way to meet people, it was nice to see a familiar face when you woke up.

My roommate and I got to our room and immediately noticed that the phone was not working nor did the door lock. We were surprised because nobody else was having problems besides us. We went down to the front desk to complain and the service was great. Our whole group had mostly the 400th floor which we could not be moved to because it was filled. Because of the inconvenience, they upgraded us up to the Executive Suite with free hors d'oeuvres and breakfast!!! Even though we had all meals provided by Berkeley it was great to have an extra snack whenever we felt like it.

As soon as we got there, we had about 20 minutes to get ready then go downstairs to start our meetings and workshops. The workshops were really fun and entertaining. We were divided into teams and our goal was to come up with ideas and a proposal for Berkeley to be more environmentally friendly. At the last day of the leadership we got to show our presentations to the group and listen to others.

Some of the activities that we did were very fun and entertaining. For example we had Karaoke night the first night we were there. We had a pool and a hot tub which we all made a good use out of. We had a gym that was open 24 hours a day which was great for people who like to exercise during off hours. We also did activities that helped us get to know each other. For example we had to bring one item for show and tell and explain why that piece is important to us. Another fun activity was doing a Lifeline exercise where we drew a lifeline and showed the ups and downs of our life. This really helped us get to know each other and make us feel comfortable around each other.

In the evenings we had free time to ourselves which was great! We went to downtown Princeton and explored all the little streets in the area with shops. We ended up getting some Starbucks hot chocolate since it was so cold outside. Since there was not much to do besides go to bars and/or restaurants we ended up exploring the Princeton University campus which was amazing.

The trip really ended up being a lot of fun and entertaining. It was a great time for students and staff to bond and figure out how to be great leaders. It really helped me understand who I am, and how I can help Berkeley College and the community.