IA Reflection #6

On April 5th, I attended Go Buckeye Day as a Student panel speaker. I answered questions from incoming freshmen about IA Scholars, Ohio State, and Freshman Year. I also gave my insights on how to succeed in Freshman year and throughout college. I would like to count this event as my Service event. For my final post, I am going to reflect on the past two years and what I’ve learned. This in itself is a difficult task since a lot can happen within these past two years and it can be difficult to think about how it all has affected my experience. Thus, I’d like to split my reflection into two focus areas: personal and academic.

Academics is a very important part of my life here at Ohio State, but looking back on how I’ve personally grown and changed is still important for reflecting on my first two years.  For one, I feel that my first two years of college have made me a much more outgoing person. In High school, I was a much more shy person, but college has helped me to develop better social and speaking skills. I believe that IA had a very important role in this development. By placing me in a living community with people that have similar interests, IA helped me to build my first group of friends at OSU.

Academically, I have grown tremendously over the last two years. In high school, I did not anticipate how difficult college would be or how much discipline it would require. Through some rough trial and error, college has taught me how to stay organized, plan, and how to effectively study. It was difficult at times, but I feel that I have really grown as a student. For example, several of my classes have had me reading a large number of articles and papers for each lecture. What these type of classes has made me learn is how to absorb information in a more efficient way. I believe that my experience at Ohio State has been very good, but there are things that I wish I had done differently. For one, I wish that I had put in more work towards exploring other possibilities for majors or minors. I love my International Studies major, but having a more open mind might have led me to City and Regional planning sooner, which I hope to pursue in grad school.

Overall, my last two years have been an experience full of growth and change. There have been parts that I would have liked to change, but I would not want my experience as a whole and what I have learned to change. I believe that my college career so far has set me up to succeed in the future. I will continue to struggle and grow from my classes and I will try to continue to push my boundaries socially. IA has been an integral part of this process and I am very grateful for the role it has played in my life.

 

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