Month: April 2016

Year In Review

When I first got accepted into Ohio State I was ecstatic; it was one of my top choice schools and I knew that I was likely to end up there next fall. I few weeks later I found out that I had also been accepted into the scholars program at OSU and decided that I would make the trek from New York to Ohio in January to attend the accepted scholars day where I would hear about the different scholars groups. Before coming I thought I would want to join the art scholars. I had always been largely involved in art and music in high school and I thought that the art scholars would be a way for me to pursue these passions. However, I also listened to a presentation from the STEM EE scholar. They were a new a program and I liked the idea that I could be in a program that was still figuring itself and essentially could be a part of shaping it. For that reason I decided to pick STEM as my top scholar’s group choice.

Move in day in August was crazy. I had to pack up my life in New York and drive for about ten hours in a packed car full of my stuff and my family. Once I got here I was faced with reality: I’m going to be living with three strangers hundreds of miles away from my friends and families for almost a year. However, I was excited. I love my town in New York but I was ready for something new and different. So I unpacked everything said goodbye to my family and began to settle myself into my college life. I made plenty of friends and I was thoroughly enjoying myself. Initially I was a declared biochemistry and math double major so I had a pretty full course load including honors calculus and general chemistry. In high school I never worried about my grade and rarely studied; I took AP level courses but I never felt overwhelmed by work or really worried how I would do on tests. In that first semester at OSU I was faced with the reality that there will be classes that I have to work to get good grades in and I will have to spend a lot of my time balancing the work load between classes for me, first semester was also when I realized that I didn’t really want to be a biochemistry major. For most of my life I had thought that I wanted to pursue some sort of research chemistry of biochemistry, yet from the moment I stepped into gen chem lab I realized this was not something that I wanted to do. Additionally, I was enjoying meeting people from all sorts of STEM fields though my scholars group. It was nice to live with a community of people that all shared some similar passions. Furthermore, through the service projects with experimental development groups I had an opportunity to spark the interest in STEM that is so critical to my life in younger children.

During second semester I came in with a slightly new mindset: I was only a mathematics major, no more biochemistry. I was very happy about this choice because it allowed me to truly throw myself into my love of math and encouraged me to pursue my math degree on the rigorous honors theoretical track. Additionally, I took two humanities general education courses which allowed myself time to connect to fields outside of my major. Also, these classes were good times for me to reflect upon social issues that while are very important to me don’t necessarily have to be with STEM and my major. Overall, during second semester I spent more time doing work for classes as I was in two high level math courses but I also made time for myself to relax. I made sure that there were weekends when I could hang out with friends and I gave myself times when I could relax. This was very important for me so that I wouldn’t become too stressed about my increasingly rigorous academic load. Additionally, I began to appreciate STEM more and will definitely miss living with the community next year. However, through STEM I have met people that I will be friends with for a long time and am encouraged to stay involved with it next year.

Overall the first year of college was just as crazy as one could expect. It had its ups and downs but ultimately was a transformative experience for myself. I am happy that I chose OSU and STEM EE scholars as I think they have given me an opportunity to flourish. Though I can’t wait for a break this summer, I know next year will be just as exciting and I am looking forward to continuing my education at OSU.

GOALS Essay

The GOALS of the Honors and Scholars program at the Ohio State University are Global Awareness, Original Inquiry, Academic Enrichment, Leadership Development, and Service Engagement. All of these are important endeavors but some will affect my education and career goals more than others.

The goal of the Honors and Scholars program at OSU that I think will by the most applicable to me as a further my studies and move towards my career is that of academic enrichment. As I continue on the honors theoretical mathematics track working toward my B.S. in Mathematics I will being taking continually challenging courses. Though some of these are more general such as honors linear algebra and differential equations some are much more specialized such as honors combinatorics. By taking these more specialized courses I will be greatly enhancing my academic ability by helping myself discover what specific type of mathematics I enjoy the most and ultimately want to pursue in my graduate education. Furthermore, I am also pursuing a statistics minor along with my math major which will enrich my skill set for when I am applying for graduate school and looking for a job. Another way in which I am involved in academic enrichment is through the STEM EE scholars program through which we attend many different events that cover topics in a variety of different STEM fields. These events allow you to learn about fields of STEM you may never have hear of and further your overall knowledge and appreciate for all fields of STEM.

I also find the goal of Service Engagement to be one that is very important to me. Ever since I was about seven I have volunteered my time, and continue to do so, at my local library to help the Friends of the Kingston library, a nonprofit fundraising group, raise money through three book sales per year. The money raised in these sales go to Children’s Library programs where the library brings various people and groups for free children’s’ Saturday programs. Furthermore, the used books sold, which are all provided through donations, are sold at very low prices ($0.25 kids’ books, $0.50 paperbacks, $1 hard backs, etc.) which allows for low income families to have access to books and helps promote literacy within the community. In addition to help running the sales I also help shelve and organize donations throughout the year in preparation for the sales. Another way in which I am involved in service engagement is through my Experimental Development group as part of my service for the STEM EE scholars program. For ED I work with a group of two other STEM scholars to develop and experiment that we will present to children ages 7-16. We then bring our experiment to either a local Columbus elementary school or to a Columbus Metropolitan Library bench. There we show and explain the experiment to the kids in hopes of sparking their interest in STEM fields.

Overall, the GOALS of the Honors and Scholars program are very important both to me and to the community and I can’t wait to extend my involvement with them as my college education continues. In particular I plan to further my Academic Enrichment by going on to graduate school and obtaining a career in some sort of higher level mathematics. In addition, I will be participating in OSU’s STEP program in which I will make a plan to use $2,000 to somehow enrich myself either academically or culturally. As for service engagement, I will continue to work with the Friends of the Kingston Library and next year will be participate in a service project to STEM EE scholars.

Artifact #1

Buckeyethon 2016

This photo is from when I participated in Buckeyethon on February 5, 2016. Buckeyethon is an organization that raises money from children fighting cancer at Nationwide’s Children’s hospital and puts on a dance marathon For The Kids. To participate in the dance marathon I raised over $250 for Buckeyethon. This was a particularly meaningful experience since we got to make a positive impact for children fighting cancer as well as stay up all night dancing For The Kids.