Going to Ohio State has definitely changed and impacted my life in multiple ways. Due to COVID-19 I can firmly say that my experience as Ohio State is much different than the freshman classes that came before us. We have had to adapt to a whole new system where everything is online. Having online schooling has not been very easy for many people, including me, I found myself lacking in motivation and having to figure out new ways to get myself to actually do work. I have had to learn how to balance my life so that I study and get good grades, am able to meeting people and socialize, and get a few hours of sleep in every night. It took a while to finally be able to do all three; however, once I adapted to not being able to do everything, I instantly felt better about being able to succeed as a student. I do not think that I have fully adapted to online schooling yet but since we seem to be doing this until who knows when, I am going to keep pushing and figure out how to succeed throughout these tough times.
Overall, my time at Ohio State has been amazing. I love everything about it, the campus, the people, the environment and a few classes. I really like the fact that I truly have independence and freedom; however, with that freedom comes a lot of responsibility and I think I have been able to responsibly utilize my freedom. When I first arrived, I had to remember that it was not one giant party, I actually had a goal and I had things that I needed to accomplish. While it felt, at times, that I do not have enough time to get anything done, I have found that going to work out or simply talking to my suitemates has been able to give me the push I needed to accomplish what I need. While I found it challenging, it was something that I really enjoyed having to learn about.
I did not think that I would miss home as much as I did during my first semester. I am lucky, in that, my parents live an hour and forty-five minutes away from campus because there have been a few occasions when I randomly needed to go home. As excited as I am that I have my freedom, sometimes when I am having a rough day or week, I just need a hug from my mom or to have my dad talk some sense into me. They are the people who know me the best and they know how to calm me down when I am having a freak out and I missed how easy it was, when living at home, to go and talk to them.
At the beginning of the year, I was really struggling in a couple of my classes. I kept getting bad grade after bad grade and I was really worried that I was not going to do well overall. I ended up having trouble sleeping and focusing because of my worry. But, like I said before, I had my parents who I called on multiple occasions and they helped me keep pushing and create motivation for myself so that I would eventually succeed. Because of this, I actually did not do as terribly in my classes as I thought I would. I think that I expected college to be similar to high school academically; however, within the first couple of weeks, I quickly learned that college is much more difficult. Nevertheless, I kept pushing and I would definitely consider that an achievement.
For spring semester, I would like to get out of my comfort zone much more. I have always been pretty shy and I was really looking forward to college because I could be anyone I wanted to be when I got here. Then COVID happened and I was not able to go out, meet new people, and push myself out of my comfort zone. Although next semester might not be much different, I would like to continue the progress I have made and keep pushing myself and keep growing as a person.