freshman

A Year In Review: Year 1

Since coming to OSU, have you seen any personal growth into who you are now? What were your expectations and preconceived notions about college and HSS? Were those initial expectations met? What are your goals for your 2nd Year in HSS and at OSU?

Reflecting on the near-completion of my first-year at OSU, I am amazed at how far I came and the experiences I gained. I have witnessed personal growth in my ability to take on more tasks and a heavier workload than in high school. Taking on Chinese for my foreign language requirement was something I hated in the first few months on campus but I came to enjoy how rewarding it is to make all this progress. Plus, I really liked the five Chinese TAs I saw (one for each day of the week) who made the in-class work enjoyable. Also, I found employment and another family at Sloopy’s Diner in the Ohio Union. Working in the Dessert Shop whipping up milkshakes (which did not bring boys to the yard), cookie a la modes, fudge brownies and other delectable delicacies entailed some physical labor and endurance. Standing for 5 hour shifts was something I quickly became accustomed to, and I improved customer service skills. Teamwork does make the dream work! Another way I grew is that I am more self-aware. I handle stress better and know when and who to turn to when I need additional assistance. I realize that I need time to recharge. Do not feel shameful or guilty for spending that half-hour or hour catching up on Netflix or painting your nails – taking breaks works for me, and should work for others too. Also important is my increased openness to new ideas, even ones that challenge my thoughts and beliefs (the 2016 election was a difficult time for the whole world, and I learned to be vocal about my rights and not remain silent, but that it was ok to engage in debate.) I lived with a complete stranger this year (I grew up sleeping with my mom and brother in the same room my entire life). My environment changed so much but I love my current surroundings. If I could pick a single facet that makes OSU so great, I would have to choose the people.

Image may contain: 10 people, people smiling, outdoor

The 2017-2018 cohort of Health Sciences Scholars first years! We are residing in Park-Stradley Hall because our community lives and learns together. I am in the second row 7th from the right, wearing a red sweater underneath my shirt.

I was placed into my first choice Scholars program, Health Sciences Scholars (HSS), so I was enthusiastic about that because it most closely aligned with my career and personal interests of healthcare. I looked forward to learning how to be a skilled professional and approach public health from a biopsychosocial standpoint. HSS had a beginning-of-the-year bash with Minute-to-Win-It-like games that they called the Olympics. It was fun and broke some ice. At the start of the year, we also volunteered together as a giant group and that helped me feel more comfortable with my cohort of about a hundred students. Some first and second year Scholars volunteered a morning at the Garden of Hope, a James Cancer Hospital initiative for cancer patients to help manage their cancer and general health. The patients get to grow vegetables. I enjoyed learning about the plants and seeing cows!

Actually, HSS exceeded my expectations because we had a seminar course autumn semester where we learned about topics like multiculturalism, how to give a presentation on a disease, and health literacy. We were divided into groups to present on our chosen diseases, so this reinforced my collaboration and research skills.

Our program coordinator, Gail, really made an effort to ensure that we participated and benefitted from HSS. She put on multiple student panels for our class as well as brought in professionals such as doctors and occupational therapists (who are also OSU faculty) for the event Dining with the Department. I also really liked the HSS events; they helped my college experience because sometimes there were craft nights or stress-relief days with puppies. HSS is just one of the several different communities I am in at OSU, and we are all connected by our desire to improve the world and people’s health, whether it’s hands-on clinical interaction or community outreach. I learned much more about this field of work. In HSS, we were provided with information about resources like research opportunities, student organizations, and volunteering options. The various assignments we did for class helped strengthen my writing; I explored secondary solutions/back-up-plans if public health does not turn out well for me, and by taking personality assessments, it was not a surprise that my strong suits are helping and caring! I am a great fit for my future career.

My goals for my second year of HSS is to do exceptionally well with the Second Year Major Service Project (which requires at least 40 hours of volunteering under a certain theme) and learn from that while setting an example for younger HSS cohorts. In spring of 2018, I present my project at the HSS Symposium they have each year at Hale Hall.

I had a list of my expectations for college (a google doc with goals I wanted to achieve my first year into second year). These achievements included: getting accepted into my major, joining at least one club, committing to a volunteering opportunity, become Young Scholar Ambassador, and getting a 4.0. I fulfilled all of these! Coming into college with a framework or road map is useful. I explored the OSU website for hours and also checked out College Confidential as well as OSU’s Instagram, Facebook and YouTube channels when I had spare time. Sure, you may deviate from your proposed plans but at least you’re not going to be walking into OSU blind with no direction. (Then again, having no idea what you want to do before you arrive on campus is not necessarily bad! Welcome Week and the Involvement Fair gives you so much free stuff and they help you determine what you want to be apart of.)
I have ups and downs in college (unexpected late scholarship payments that caused me to resign from work-study for the semester, and relationship issues), but that’s all part of life. I learned how to be more flexible, more adult-like.

Mirrors Sophomore Class Honorary 2017-2018 Privileged to be among the 46 members chosen out of 106 applicants! There was an application process and interviewing round. I am happy to spend the next year (and beyond) with brilliant-minded individuals dedicated to the pillars of Service, Learning, and Leadership!

My goals for OSU in general are to dig deeper into my activities because during my first year I only touched the tip of the iceberg, and I want to get to the core of it. I know I will be a volunteer at the James Cancer Hospital, an executive-board member for a club called MUNDO, and member of Mirrors Sophomore Class Honorary. Furthermore, I will be conducting a project with STEP support and funding. I hope to be an HIV test counselor as well. Additionally, I hope I will continue to manage my academics, which are a constant challenge that I embrace with open arms.

Now that it is mid-April, I am prepping for my finals, which I anticipate will hit me harder than Holly Holms knocked out Ronda Rousey in 2015, but I know I can bounce back from that! 😉

Until next year,
Melinda Dang

Summer Bridge Experience 2016

 

HOME

My new home for the next 4 years: Columbus, or the 614.

Many people do not know about the Office of Diversity & Inclusion (ODI)’s Young Scholars Program. It is an honor to be a Scholar in this selective program, which I was inducted into during the sixth grade.

Here is a little history of the Young Scholars Program (YSP) for those interested in knowing more about it:

Established in 1988, YSP has served more than 3,000 students from the nine major cities in Ohio: Akron, Canton, Cincinnati, Cleveland, Columbus, Dayton, Lorain, Toledo, and Youngstown.
YSP helps first generation students thrive and achieve higher education. Scholars receive college preparation, academic coaching, access to resources and tools for success, and help with exploring careers and majors. Also important is the scholarship that Young Scholars receive once admitted to the university so oftentimes students graduate from OSU debt-free!
(Learn more about YSP here: http://odi.osu.edu/ysp/)

I actually had no idea what college was until one wintry day in the sixth grade, a very smiley YSP recruiter named Mr. Lofton came into my middle school English class to present to us about how YSP was a very unique, amazing opportunity. He told us our undergraduate education could potentially be paid in full! My teacher selected about 10 of us sixth-graders to fill out applications to the program, which was about a dozen pages long. It included essays and personal information about ourselves.
I was the only one in the class to receive a call back for an interview, which I did poorly on because I was shy and didn’t/couldn’t speak much. The YSP coordinator for Cleveland did not think that I was worthy of being in the program because of my inability to interact with others, but my English teacher vouched for me passionately and I was accepted into the program. I later proved that I deserved to be there.

Six years later, I am thriving in this program and am attending The Ohio State University fall of 2016!
The summer of 2016, my YSP cohort participated in a Summer Bridge Experience to help with our transition to college.


Packing

My dad’s SUV trunk packed with carts, bedding, and more!

MOVE-IN DAY/ Welcome and Orientation

On July 31, I moved into temporary housing at Lawrence Tower for a three-week Summer Bridge Experience that is mandatory for Young Scholars who are incoming freshmen. We were there for two weeks and then August 14, we were able to move into our permanent dorms.

Before Sunday, the day I would leave Cleveland for a few months, I packed my bags and boxes with tremendous help from my amazing mother. My family and I drove down to Columbus, the roughly 2-hour-ride noisy with pop music playing.

The same day, we were given a warm welcome by YSP staff and Peer Leaders, who helped escort us to our classes the first week of bridge because we were utterly lost. All meals were paid for during this experience! I learned how to use BUCKID and swipes.

Summer Schedule

Week 1 schedule: math, research writing, and more classes/workshops.

 

 

What were we Young Scholars doing during this Summer Bridge Experience?

My schedule for Bridge was busy, but still left room for meals and recreational activities. The classes I took were for personal enrichment and not for credit or for a grade at all. Some were related to career planning and personal development! We were required to take them to better prepare us for our ‘real’ courses at Ohio State. We also walked around campus a lot! (Lawrence Tower was on the edge of campus, near the Schottenstein Center! We were soaked with sweat by the end of the day (sorry for the gross image))

I was in a Research Methods writing class, which I liked a lot! We wrote research papers under the guidance of a great professor named Bob Eckhart (we call him

Uncle Bob) and presented our own individual posters at the culmination of this bridge. I researched Police Brutality on People with Mental Illnesses.

I was also in a Calculus preparation class, but I took college-level calculus previously, and did not plan on taking anymore math in college. However, it was good refresher material and required me to use my brain again.

We could choose an elective course (Psychology, Statistics, Economics, and Physics), and I chose psychology! Our teacher was a Ph.D. candidate who made the class fun.

What I really enjoyed about the entire summer bridge experience was getting the chance to familiarize myself with OSU’s campus before the rest of the students arrived. My transition was so much more smoother than I thought it would be.

Young Scholars Program cohort!

After Bridge, the cohort’s members also were enrolled in a Study Skills course for autumn semester to ensure that we could succeed in our classes, properly take notes, and analyze information. Throughout our first year, we also get success coaching (from a program coordinator) and peer-mentoring (a one-hour meeting with an upperclassman student every week to discuss life!).

I think that all incoming freshmen, especially those from low-income, first-generation, minority backgrounds, can benefit greatly from summer programs! OSU offers several to build relationships with your peers early and lessen the anxiety that you may be feeling!

https://fye.osu.edu/programs/special_eligibility.html
https://fye.osu.edu/programs/index.html
Also for early move-in, students can check out programs like OWL and R-Lead!

My First Semester of Freshman Year

One semester down – seven to go! I cannot believe that I am already halfway done with my first year at Ohio State. It seemed like yesterday I was just packing up boxes and bags to start my undergraduate career.

This semester, I learned a lot. Here’s some words of wisdom!

–Grades are not everything; your GPA is not the sole determinant of whether you will be successful or obtain a job. You are much more than a GPA! It’s just a number and your worth is not judged because of it.
This semester, I was very concerned with achieving a good GPA (ideally perfect), so that I would have a good start to college and because classes get harder as I get further into my major. I studied so much more than I ever did before: 15 hours a week, approximately. This semester, I earned a 4.0. It didn’t come without plenty of tears as I contemplated dropping out of school altogether and had existential crises, lost sleep, and skipped meals. I didn’t manage my time well enough. DO NOT SKIP MEALS OR SLEEP. Take breaks from studying and go grab fruits and vegetables and protein. When I was running on 5 hours or less of sleep, I couldn’t even think properly in class.

Some of my friends are disappointed that they did not make the Dean’s List (a 3.5 is needed). One friend is one of the smartest people I know. He is in Neuroscience Honors, and his classes were exponentially harder than mine, considering that he took chemistry, biology, and psychology all at once. It is not his fault at all; it’s hard to get a 4.0 straight off the bat in college. Do not think it is the end of the world if a grade ends up being lower than anticipated; brush yourself off and come back stronger the next semester.
From my experiences, I know now to manage my time better. I will go to office hours! I will make sure to start all assignments as early as I can, especially my papers, because they actually take longer than expected to write. There’s brainstorming, editing, peer proofreading, and more editing involved in the process of writing. I talked to advisors and peers about study habits and simply through those discussions, I realized what mistakes I was making and what I could do to improve.

–Learn how to do laundry as early as you can. Also, use Tide pods! – In early August, I learned how to do laundry. This is a skill that I should have learned a decade ago, but didn’t learn until college. My advice is to do it during high school.  Also, bring several rolls of quarters for the machines! You can use BUCKID but if you want to add 15 minutes to your time, just add a quarter instead of swiping the card again (for me in Park-Stradley Hall, it is $1.50 to wash and $1.25 to dry). Sometimes everyone is washing and drying their clothes at the same time, so find the times that no one is down in the laundry room (I go on Thursday or Friday nights, or early Saturday mornings!) Pods make it much easier to clean clothes instead of dragging along jugs of detergent! It doesn’t have to be the Tide brand.

Tide Pods! Step 1) Throw them directly into the washer! And you’re done!

–Friendships from high school will change. Most of my high school friends attend school in Cleveland; a few have ventured out-of-state! I am less close to them because they have found new friends. However, I still speak to them occasionally and make plans to hang out with them during breaks. These friendships can still work; understand that it takes effort and that they’re still friends but can’t physically be there for you all the time.

–You will be busy! I can’t do EVERYTHING even though there’s so many opportunities available. Don’t try to join every single club that you are interested in. Make a list and then narrow it down. I joined three (one meets weekly, one meets bi-weekly, and one meets monthly), and I found it challenging to attend all their meetings. Additionally, don’t feel obligated to attend every college party or other social event. You may feel like you are missing out but it’s important to strike a balance. 🙂 Set up a study party. After all, the main point of college is getting an education.

–Some things are not meant to work out; you may be rejected by a program, internship, employer, or person you were romantically interested in. Do not take it personally. Sometimes rejections happen because there are better things coming our way.
This semester, I applied to different things (Honors & Scholars Programming Board, Health Sciences Scholars Leadership Council, and a volunteering position at the James Cancer Hospital). I made it past the application stage for all three of those, but the interviews for all of them went not as well as I had hoped. I also learned that I wasn’t right for the positions after all. Make sure you actually want the position and are ready to commit to it, and not just apply to look good on an application.
One interview I had so far this school year was successful; that was mid-August when I applied to a campus job with the College of Public Health, which is where I am today! It’s a great place to work.

–Think about your actions and consequences in the future. Ask yourself if what you are doing is going to be beneficial for you in the future. Sometimes I can’t always go to Polaris or Tuttle mall every weekend. Ask yourself if what you are buying is something you will use often. (I spent so much $$$ my first semester, on clothes and food. I made a budget soon after). Make wise decisions!

–Talk to people about your feelings. I learned not to let my frustrations or negative emotions stay inside. Find someone like a friend to confide in. Let your advisors know you. No man is an island, and it’s normal to acknowledge your emotions.

–Do have fun in college! Do not lock yourself in your room or in the library. Explore Columbus. There was a free night at COSI, a science center, and thousands of students attended. I had fun there too, learning more about technology. With the Discount Tix (D-Tix) program we have, you can get discounted tickets to the Columbus Zoo and Botanical Gardens, to name a few places. Eat in the dining hall across campus once in a while. Play Frisbee in the Oval. Visit random students down the hall from you.

I cannot wait for Spring semester when I know I will make better choices and be a better student than I was before.

Hopefully my advice helps someone (even one person!). Let me know in the comments if you agree or benefitted from my suggestions, or even if it didn’t.

Freshman Year Timeline

Fall 2016

  • Participated in 3-week early arrival program in summer to prepare for college and move into dorm early
  • Joined MUNDO and Global Health Initiative
  • Worked part-time at College of Public Health as Student Assistant
  • Was randomly selected for a First in the World research study, during which I receive additional advising services from a Student Success Specialist. Criteria was qualifying for a Pell grant, being a first-generation college student, or both.  A total of 1,100 OSU students have been selected.
  • Applied for and was only freshman accepted to MUNDO alternative winter-break week-long trip to Los Angeles
  • Attended first football game with President Drake and Board of Trustees in the University Suite, for free
  • Became a Young Scholars Ambassador for the Young Scholars Program to do outreach for younger Young Scholars. I called 12th graders to discuss college and requirements with them.
  • Volunteered 20 hours at various blood drives and other service projects
  • Participated in the 2016 October walk for Making Strides Against Breast Cancer. There were 2500 walkers, volunteers and survivors. A total of $135,000 was raised. The team I walked with raised over $2,000
  • Posted a Snap which was featured on Ohio State’s Snapchat Story, and viewed by 8,000 people
  • Dean’s List and 4.0 GPA!

Spring 2017

  • Worked 15 hours a week in Ohio Union at Sloopy’s Diner
  • Volunteered at nonprofit health care center for 15 hours over winter break
  • Volunteered as Young Scholars Ambassador for Go Buckeye Day, and welcomed 128 admitted Young Scholars (who are first-generation college students) to campus for the all-day event
  • Participated in MUNDO Multicultural Leadership trip to Cincinnati and Louisville, KY in January 2017
  • Awarded $2,000 OH-IO Education Abroad scholarship
  • Attended College of Public Health 2017 Spring Career Fair
  • Inducted into Mirrors Sophomore Class Honorary. 106 applicants and 46 members were chosen
  • Inducted into ALDPES, Alpha Lambda Delta and Phi Eta Sigma Honor Society
  • Elected to Global Health Initiative executive board as Event Planning co-chair
  • Elected to MUNDO executive board as Social Media and Marketing Correspondent
  • Participated in annual Involved Learning Organization (ILO) retreat
    MUNDO is one of the six central Involved Living Organizations within Residence Life which supports efforts to create the extraordinary student experience at The Ohio State University
  • Featured in a USAToday article that received over 2,000 shares. Article was about how I benefitted from an AmeriCorps member’s service while I was in high school applying for college
  • Accepted into BSPH major
  • Declared Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies minor
  • Dean’s List and 4.0 GPA to end freshman year!
  • Accepted as Summer Bridge Experience Peer Leader for Young Scholars Program for Summer 2017