16: The Final Blog

This semester has been a complete whirlwind of emotions and I have to say that although there were some bumps in the road, these 16 weeks have been a great learning experience.  During this semester I have been happy, stressed, tired and so many other things, but I wouldn’t trade my experience for anything because it has helped shape into a stronger and better person. Now that this semester is over, I think it is the perfect time to just take a deep breath and look back on what had worked for me, and what things do I need to improve on before the start of the next semester and how.

I knew that in order for me to be as successful as I would like to be that I would need to create good habits to get me through this semester and those to come, and I think I did that pretty well. Leaving high school to come to college I knew that there was going to be more expected from me and that no one was going to remind me to do it, so I had to make sure that I stayed on top of it. I did my best to get the bulk of my work done during the week so I had the weekends to relax and spend that time with my friends and family, and that helped me to stay well rested and allow me to put my best work forward. I also took Ashley’s advice into consideration; whenever I had free time I made sure I was using it wisely. I always used that time to start something new so I never had to worry about pulling an all nighter and have to hand in something that I knew wasn’t my best. Although I think I created some good habits for myself, there I things that I think I could have worked on. Looking back I wished I had used more of the resources here, like the office of study skills to help me be better prepared for quizzes and tests; and I know next semester I will definitely be using those resources!

Now that the semester is over, I am very happy with how well I met most of my personal goals, but there is one that I didn’t meet and will be one of my main priorities for next semester. In the beginning of the semester I set a goal for myself that I would work hard and make good grades and I am proud to say that I did accomplish this goal. As of right now I don’t think that I have a grade lower than an A- and I am absolutely ecstatic about that! Meeting this goal just reassures me that my hard work paid off and I can do anything that I set my mind to as long as I have passion and the right mindset!! However there is one goal that I didn’t meet as well as I had hoped, and that is getting involved. Being a commuter I found myself making excuses as to why I could never be on campus, but I know that was just nonsense and I am only hurting myself. Next semester I plan on not only joining clubs, but also not leaving right after I get out of class. My not meeting this goal I am missing out on getting the chance to know the people on this campus and finding those lifelong friends that everyone says you meet while at college.

I have made some great strides in becoming the college student that I had hoped to become, but by no means am I done progressing. As the semesters come and go I know that it is up to me to continue to push myself to greater lengths and to challenge myself in ways that I have never done before. College, in my opinion, shapes you into the person that you are going to be for the rest of your life and it is up to you to mold yourself into the person that you want to be and can see yourself being.