For our Explore Columbus, Lisa and I journeyed to Hilltop to visit Third Way Cafe and Koko. I picked Lisa up one afternoon and took her to Third Way in order to complete our interview and our explore Columbus. I took  It took us about twenty minutes to get to the coffee shop. Once there we both ordered lattes. A wrong turn on the way there so it took me a bit longer to get there than it normally does. Lisa ordered a hot latte and I ordered an iced latte. Lisa told me she does not really like iced coffee because she does not think it tastes as good. I disagreed with her. I like iced coffee because I feel like it is more of a casual coffee drink. I like to be able to drink my coffee over an extended period of time, especially if I am doing homework. I need the energy to last as long as possible to get through all of my work. We worked on our interview for the first few minutes. We were catching up on how our semester was going and what was new in our lives. It is nice to be able to see someone outside of my normal bubble of people. During the pandemic, it can feel hard to socialize with people, but this assignment gave me a reason to see someone other than my roommates. I learned how Lisa is going to live in the German house next year instead of a dorm room. I thought that this was very neat and a great way to meet new people. Especially since she is majoring in German, I thought she would be able to gain so much experience from this opportunity. After we finished talking and catching up we worked on homework until the coffee shop closed at three. This coffee shop has a very homey feel. Whenever I go there it seems like everyone who walks in knows each other. I am curious how they all know each other, but it is nice to see a family establishment being successful.

 I picked this coffee shop because it is next to one of my favorite gems in Columbus. I told her about this super fun sustainability store that I have been very excited about. It is called Koko. This sustainability store has a refillery where you can bring in your own jars or bottles and fill them up with shampoo, conditioner, lotions, laundry detergent, all-purpose cleaner, and so many other products. They also sell reusable cleaning products, candles, feminine products, reusable kitchen items, and beauty products. This store is so fun and unique I love to stop by every time I go to Third Way. Unfortunately, it was a Monday, and Koko is closed on Mondays. I told her we would go again next week so she would be able to experience this great store. I picked her up the next week and we went to Koko. While there Lisa was able to see and experience this sustainability store. We both brought our own bottles to refill with the products we wanted. Lisa decided to not purchase anything as the store was out of sunscreen which was the item she wanted. I purchased a milk and honey lotion, handsoap, and dog shampoo for my puppy Pierre. The store is not very expensive for the amount of product you get and the cause it goes to. I will continue to shop here and recommend others to shop here and lead a more sustainable life.

Overall, I had a great experience on our explore Columbus adventure. We were able to go to a great coffee shop to catch up on our lives and go to a store with a cause we are both passionate about. I would recommend Third Way Cafe to anyone. It is a bit far from campus and you will need a car to get there, but the atmosphere is worth it. Whether you want to spend hours there doing homework or just want a decent cup of coffee. Third Way is a great place to try if you are looking for a new coffee shop to explore. I will forever recommend Koko to everyone. They are helping the world with sustainability and showing people how easy it can be. I love their motto and the products they have. It is such a fun and cute store to visit even if it’s just to peruse their products. I had a great time with Lisa and cannot wait to spend more time with her!

My mentee is Lisa Voegler. She is from Twinsburg, Ohio studying German and Psychology. We went to Third Way Cafe in Hilltop to complete this interview. The five questions I asked her were:

• What kind of study habits have you developed? Did they work successfully in the fall?
• Do you think you will keep your same involvement next year? Why or why not?
• What recommendations do you have for improving the ACES program?
• Have your career plans changed since your first semester? Why or why not?
• What kind of goals have you set for yourself for this semester?

For the first question, Lisa said she has found a good rhythm for school and what she needs to do to be successful in her schoolwork. The main habit she found is writing everything down in her planner. If she can see everything she has to complete, then there is a lesser chance she will forget an assignment. She would also write down what days she would want to complete these items. I thought this was a very good idea and a great way to keep good time management. She also liked finding places to study other than her dorm. She would go to 18th Avenue Library and study for hours until she completed her work. She would also go to the Union to study. She found it better for her to complete her work outside of her dorm, otherwise, she would not feel motivated. These habits did work for her in the fall semester. She was able to complete all of her work and she received straight A’s.

Lisa said she will try to get more involved next year on campus. This year she had a very difficult time finding groups to get involved with and stay involved with. She didn’t feel much connection with groups over Zoom calls so she is hoping that with more events being in person next year she will find more organizations to join. She would really like to join a choir or acapella group. I think many ACES members feel this way, even I do. Hopefully, next year will be better for all of OSU so we can find involvement in organizations. 

The main recommendation Lisa has for ACES is to have more in-person events. While we were unable to control whether or not we were allowed to have in-person events I do agree with Lisa. It is hard for ACES members to meet and get to know each other over Zoom. Hopefully next year the group can meet in person and form connections with other members. 

Lisa’s career plans have not changed. She has gained more of an idea of what she will want to do, but they have not changed. She does want to get more involved with aspects regarding her major. Such as looking for internships or volunteering in her respective field. Her career plans remain to be an academic advisor for English-speaking students in Germany or German-speaking students in the United States. One way she is strengthening her passion for German is by living in the German House on campus next year. This is a house of students who are from Germany or speak German. This will help her learn more about culture and meet new people. 

For this semester she set the goal of getting straight A’s and balancing her social and academic life. So far Lisa is doing a great job and has all A’s in her classes. She did have a few challenging classes but nothing too difficult. She does wish to find more of a balance between academic and social life. She does find time to be social but not as much time as she would hope.

Going through this interview with Lisa was very helpful for me to learn more about her and how her school year is going. Learning this information will help me provide her with advice and suggestions to get her through her first year with ease. It was very nice hanging out with Lisa at the coffee shop and being able to talk about how her school year is going.

My mentee is Lisa Vogeler and she is from Twinsburg, Ohio. She is double majoring in German and Psychology. We went to Grandview Grind to complete our interview and talk about how the school year was going so far. The questions that I asked her were: 

• • How did you decide on the major you have chosen?
  • What type of volunteering and involvement were you involved with in high school?
  • Why did you choose ACES?
  • What is your dream job and why?
  • How will you balance academics and involvement? 

Lisa said that she did not have a specific way of choosing her majors. Her family is from Germany and she speaks German at home. She wanted to major in this to learn more about writing in German to perfect this skill. She chose to major in Psychology to further her interpersonal skills. She was not entirely sure what major would go along with this so she chose to major in psychology. 

In high school, Lisa was involved in the Interact Club. Interact Club is a club that is sponsored by the Rotary Club in their town. Lisa told me that it was difficult to get funding from the school for projects since it was not technically sponsored by the school and instead the Rotary Club. I thought this was very interesting that the school did not help fund service projects. When they had meetings they would have to meet at the public library instead of at the school which made it more difficult for people to join the club. One big event that they held every year was the Snow Ball. This was a dance they held for little kids and all of the proceeds would go to a charity such as Smile Child or Autism Speaks.

When I asked Lisa why she wanted to be in ACES she said, “I didn’t choose ACES, ACES chose me.” I thought this was a very relatable sentence. When I applied to be in honors and scholars I put ACES as my second choice. However, I was put into ACES and it was probably the best thing that could have happened as I have met so many wonderful people and made lasting friendships. Lisa also wanted a part of a community that was focused around community service and advocacy, which ACES is focused on. 

Lisa’s dream job is to be an Academic Advisor for students in Germany. She would want to work at a university in Germany and be the advisor for English or American students. She has always wanted to be an advisor and help students, but living and working in Germany would be the dream to live out her heritage. I thought this was a very ambitious dream job to have. I think it would be amazing to work in a different country and experience and learn their culture; however, I also think it would be difficult at the beginning to find your way and make friends. 

When explaining how she will balance academics and involvement she said she would have to plan her time wisely. She loves to use a planner, so using this daily and updating it on her assignments and club activities will keep her balanced. She also recommends prioritizing her activities and assignments, such as it is better to work on a project that is due sooner than one that is due later in time. 

While some of Lisa’s experiences and interests are different than mine most of them are similar which I will be able to help mentor her with. I will be able to use the similarities of our freshman year to guiding her and providing advice and feedback based on my experiences. On the aspects that we do not have in common, I will be able to provide my advice but not specific experiences that I have endured. I am excited to continue to get to know Lisa and help her with her first year at Ohio State. 

For our exploration of Columbus, Lisa and I went to two different coffee shops. The first one we went to was Grandview Grind. I picked Lisa up from her dorm and then I drove us to the coffee shop. I would recommend driving to this location as it is a bit far from campus. There might be a COTA that goes close to this location, but it was much easier to drive there. It was both of our first times going there. It was a small coffee shop located in Grandview, Ohio. We both ordered latte’s and then we worked on homework there. We were there for a few hours getting to know each other and talking about how our weeks have been. Lisa was explaining to me how she was getting ready to go on vacation with her family and was excited to get out of her dorm for awhile. 

Lisa also talked to me about how dorm selection would work for her sophomore year. I told her she would need to pick a roommate group by February as you have to create the group and then housing will send out a lottery number of your selection. I told her how when I was doing this process I had a difficult time finding a roommate as my roommate was joining a sorority and everyone I knew already had a roommate. I also told her that most of the larger dorm rooms get picked first so if she and her roommate group would like to pick this option then they will have to hope for a low lottery number. We then talked about if she would be allowed to live off-campus next year. I told her it was a possibility since I was able to with everything happening with COVID. I told her that I really like living off-campus with the ability to cook my own meals. I think that the ability to cook has allowed me to not get as exhausted through the semester as I did when I could only eat campus food. 

Overall, we both had a great experience and enjoyed this coffee shop. I could recommend it to a friend as it has great options for coffee and local bakery treats. It is also one of the closer options of a coffee shop near campus, so it would be a great study spot for students looking to do homework off-campus. 

In our next exploration of Columbus experience, we went to The Roosevelt Coffeehouse. I am a regular at this coffee shop, but it was Lisa’s first time. I come here about once a week and love their ice maple lattes. I also ordered a blueberry pop tart, which was made by a vegan and gluten-free bakery. It was very good and I would gladly order it again. Lisa ordered an iced oat milk latte. She said she always tries to order oat milk as she thinks it tastes better than normal whole milk in lattes. 

This coffee shop is located in downtown Columbus, Ohio. I picked Lisa up from her dorm and drove us to the coffee shop. It was about a 10-minute drive. I do know that a COTA does go from campus to downtown, so if we did not have a car we could have taken the COTA and then walked the rest of the way to Roosevelt. 

We spent a few hours there working on homework. I worked on my medieval history videos, while she worked on her psychology assignments. She told me she really liked this coffee shop as it has many tables for studying and great coffee options. 

While we were here we talked about school and how her classes are going. She told me her one psychology class is not very interesting and that it is hard to have the motivation to complete the assignments. She also told me that her teacher for this class is not a very difficult grader and with knowing this she does not have to put in a lot of effort into her assignments. I also told her that I have been lacking motivation in my classes. With everything online this semester it is difficult to continue doing the same assignments each week. It has become repetitive and quite boring. So with the last stretch of the semester coming, we must work harder to keep up our motivation to finish strong. 

Lisa really enjoyed our time together and said she really loved the coffee and the atmosphere of the Roosevelt Coffeehouse. That being said she said she would love to come back next semester. I told her I come almost every week so I would love it if she tagged along with me next semester. Roosevelt is one of the most amazing coffee shops in Columbus and we both would recommend it to anyone who has not been able to experience it yet!

During my junior year of high school, I joined the group DECA. This is an organization that competes in business marketing competitions throughout the nation. During my senior year, I competed with a group and we wrote a 20-page research paper for the business services operations category of the competition. We chose the company Paramount Insurance located in Toledo, Ohio to focus our research. While doing research we sent out surveys to Paramount Insurance users to get their opinion on cause marketing. My group decided to run a cause marketing campaign called Home for Hardships. This would be a home for women who are victims of domestic violence or substance abuse. We would offer a safe place for them to come and stay and receive treatment to help them get back on their feet. This was a fake campaign but I learned so much new information about what goes into building a shelter. 

While at the competition judges read our paper and critiqued it. Then we had to give a 15-minute presentation in front of those judges. My group did very well and we placed seventh in the state. This project helped me learn research skills and good public speaking techniques. This was my first big research project and it helped me learn skills that will benefit me in the future. 

Research Paper

The ACES Pillars Film Projects is a group project that I presented in my SCHOLAR 1100.01 class. My group watched the film The Hunting Ground. This documentary dives deep into the college experience of females, especially their experience with sexual assault. This film talks about how colleges a    were not supporting the survivors and helping to find and punish the assaulter. Then two survivors, Annie Clark and Andrea Pino, decided to take action and file a Title IX lawsuit against the University of North Carolina. This swept across the nation and now colleges are advocating for victims of sexual assault and not letting the culprit get away with it. I was shocked about how colleges would just let this assault go unnoticed. I didn’t realize how big of a problem this was until a map of all of the colleges where this was occurring was showed. This was happening across the nation and it is terrible to know that these victims are not getting the support that they deserve. It was truly an eye-opening movie and I would recommend that everyone should watch this to understand how to advocate for sexual assault victims. 

The Hunting Ground Presentation