While all five of the principles of the G.O.A.L.S. of the Honors & Scholars provide a great structure for personal growth and achievement, there are two in particular that are more applicable to me than the others in relation to both short-term and long-term success. These two facets are Academic Enrichment and Original Inquiry.
Academic Enrichment is particularly important to me as an actuarial science major and future actuary. By extension of my plans after graduation, it is necessary that I pass certain actuarial exams in order to become certified and practice my future craft. These exams are difficult and normally require several hours of study. As such, Academic Enrichment is extremely important to me so that I can learn the required material in order to pass said actuarial exams. Academic Enrichment has also always been rather important to me throughout my earlier years of schooling. I have always enrolled in the hardest classes offered by my schools simply because I enjoy gaining new knowledge and engaging in challenging curricula. Academic Enrichment has become no less important to me since my then. In fact, it has only become more important to me. When I first enrolled in OSU I was only an actuarial science major. Since then, I have met with my academic adviser and, at the risk of an extremely challenging course-load, have added the mathematics major and am currently double majoring. Additionally, I am looking into possibly taking additional classes past the double major in order to get a minor in either business and economics (which would also put my hours high enough to earn two separate degrees). My long-term plans for utilizing Academic Enrichment in my life currently consists of studying for actuarial exams after graduation to become certified in the required fields and constantly learning new techniques in my career field in order to stay ahead.
The other important facet to me is Original Inquiry. If I were to personally define Original Inquiry I would use the platitude ‘thinking outside the box’. While it can be much more than this cliché, this definition functions better for a discourse on how Original Inquiry effects me personally. This facet speaks to me personally for a large part because I enjoy approaching problems from unique angles, and I firmly believe this is an important skill to have for handling any number of problems, as eventually the normally used method for solving a problem will fail. Under such a circumstance, one must be able to handle said problem with another method, and at this point this skill becomes invaluable. Additionally, this facet has been helpful to me for solving new problems, as this skill has allowed me to approach new, original problems from unique angles, allowing me to easily solve problems where normal methods would cause one to flounder. This principle is also important to me in a future career perspective. As an actuary, I will undoubtedly encounter problems that will need to be approached from a unique angle using the cumulative sum of my knowledge to solve the problem successfully or most efficiently. As far as using this skill in the short-run, I plan on mainly using it for aforementioned reasons, in order to solve new or complex problems (both academic and personal) where normal methods would fail.
While all five of the facets of G.O.A.L.S. are important to me and are a great model to follow for personal and career development, Original Inquiry and Academic Enrichment are both particularly important to me personally and career wise. Academic Enrichment is important to me because I have an intrinsic love of learning and plan to utilize it heavily for my career goals and Original Inquiry because I plan on using it to problem solve in all aspects of life, including my career, in order to do things as efficiently as possible.
