Over the course of this first semester in college I have had to learn a lot of self-discipline and time management. During high school all I had to do was show up, do some homework, go to my job, and then on weekends I got to relax and hangout with my friends. It was a system that I had mastered and didn’t really have to stress over. Now, if I lose focus for a day or two and fall behind I will have to spend lots of time working back to where I should be. I’ve been used to going to class everyday, and now I have to make sure I study everyday to compensate for the limited amount of time in class. I have ended up struggling a great deal with this at times, where I just cannot work up the motivation to do work even though I know it’s best for me. The hardest part is knowing that I have to do the work and I just could not get myself focused on it. Then eventually right before it’s due I would end up working on it really fast to finish it, even if it’s not my best work and I know I can do better. Now as the semester is coming closer to an end I find it much easier to get myself to do work that I need to do. This is because now the motivation is to do the best I can since I know how badly it can affect my grade.
Artifact 2
From fall of 2017 to May of 2018, I was a part of the student leadership board of a charity fundraiser at my high school called the SJ5K. This event has gone on for several years, sponsoring several families who recently went through a medical crisis and need their communities financial and emotional support to get through these troubling times. In the year I participated we had the most families we have chosen to help than ever before, so as a part of the fundraising team there was lots of stress to make sure we had enough for everyone to benefit from it. This event was very important to me because a lot of the families have had someone affected by cancer, which is something I’ve seen personally in my family. Additionally, I wish to pursue oncology in my future so it always gave me extra motivation to go out and work harder for them. This experience helped open my eyes to how much of a difference you can make in the world if you have a small group of people working towards a cause. My team had only about 8 people, but the event in total raised roughly $50,000 for all of the families. In the future I would like to remember the race day, as a part of the fundraising team I never got to interact with the family that much before this. Before the race started all of them shared their stories, and how much the emotional support helped their family and it is something they will never forget. This experience pushed me out of my comfort zone because I’m a very introverted person. However, I had to be out-going, warm, and friendly when I went into businesses or contacted them asking for donations to help us. This also helped me demonstrate my strong-willed personality because some managers at businesses tried to avoid talking to me, but over time after coming back and calling enough they all were willing to help our cause.
Welcome to my Honors & Scholars e-Portfolio
[The Home Page will show a running blog of your recent posts, which are categorized and show on that category’s page. Please delete this post or edit with your own information.]
Year in Review
[ “Year in Review” is where you should reflect on the past year and show how you have evolved as a person and as a student. You may want to focus on your growth in a particular area (as a leader, scholar, researcher, etc.) or you may want to talk about your overall experience over the past year. For more guidance on using your ePortfolio, including questions and prompts that will help you get started, please visit the Honors & Scholars ePortfolio course in Carmen. To get answers to specific questions, please email eportfolio@osu.edu. Delete these instructions and add your own post.]
G.O.A.L.S.
[ “G.O.A.L.S.” is a place where students write about how their planned, current, and future activities may fit into the Honors & Scholars G.O.A.L.S.: Global Awareness, Original Inquiry, Academic Enrichment, Leadership Development, and Service Engagement. For more guidance on using your ePortfolio, including questions and prompts that will help you get started, please visit the Honors & Scholars ePortfolio course in Carmen. To get answers to specific questions, please email eportfolio@osu.edu. Delete these instructions and add your own post.
- Global Awareness: Students cultivate and develop their appreciation for diversity and each individual’s unique differences. For example, consider course work, study abroad, involvement in cultural organizations or activities, etc.
- Original Inquiry: Honors & Scholars students understand the research process by engaging in experiences ranging from in-class scholarly endeavors to creative inquiry projects to independent experiences with top researchers across campus and in the global community. For example, consider research, creative productions or performances, advanced course work, etc.
- Academic Enrichment: Honors & Scholars students pursue academic excellence through rigorous curricular experiences beyond the university norm both in and out of the classroom.
- Leadership Development: Honors & Scholars students develop leadership skills that can be demonstrated in the classroom, in the community, in their co-curricular activities, and in their future roles in society.
- Service Engagement: Honors & Scholars students commit to service to the community.]
Career
[“Career” is where you can collect information about your experiences and skills that will apply to your future career. Like your resume, this is information that will evolve over time and should be continually updated. For more guidance on using your ePortfolio, including questions and prompts that will help you get started, please visit the Honors & Scholars ePortfolio course in Carmen. To get answers to specific questions, please email eportfolio@osu.edu. Delete these instructions and add your own post.]
Artifacts
This artifact represents my Oncology Capstone presentation from my senior year in high school. This was from an independent study I took on cancer cell biology. During this time I was the only one taking the course so I had to teach myself how cancer forms inside individual cells, and how it travels throughout the body. Since this was an independent study that is not always taken at my high school, my instructor was not familiar was not familiar with all of the curriculum. So once I read through it and taught it to myself, I would then have to go through each chapter and explain it to my instructor. At the end of the course, I created this presentation, which has a link and two screenshots below and presented it to all of the AP Biology sections that were at our school.
In this experience I learned about how cancer works, however more importantly I learned about what you can learn if you are willing to put the time in every day to something. Prior to this course, I had very little previous knowledge about these details of cancer. I would have to sit and read a college textbook every day, constantly looking up what things are so the material wasn’t going over my head. Now looking back at it it was a very informative course, not only with the knowledge I gained but also in what I learned I was capable of.
I will use this in the future because I plan to be pursuing research in oncology. This will start in my undergraduate studies, with my major being molecular genetics. When I graduate I plan on moving on to medical school, and in my professional career, I hope to become an oncologist. From personal experiences, where I have seen how cancer can touch so many people. Carrying into my academic experience, in learning the details of how this disease takes over parts of the body; I have a newfound, deep passion for the study I plan to carry throughout life.
About Me
Hello!
My name is Chris Merkel, I am now a freshman at The Ohio State University. During high school I was a part of Project Lead the Way’s biomedical science program which introduced me to the medical field. The series of classes I went through applied the medical field into a biology class; ranging over a wide variety of diseases, in depth anatomy and physiology, as well as lots of classroom research opportunities. Another highlight during high school was the independent study I had on oncology. In this class I got to learn about the biology of cancer, and it helped me decide on wanting to continue to study oncology. I will be pursuing a molecular genetics major on a pre-medical track. During my undergraduate studies, I would like to continue to learn and research more in oncology.