I was born in Cartagena, Colombia. Four years ago, I moved to Florida with the purpose to achieve a superior education. The change from one culture to another has been made a significant event in my life. Despite the language barrier and that I am a first-generation college student, I almost finished my Associate of Arts with a moderate-high grade point average. My goal is to learn the language well and be a chemical engineer.…
Some challenges I’ve had to overcome start with me needing to get my life fixed. I used to be the student in high school that didn’t care about how they looked or what grades they got. I had no self-confidence in who I was and I had no aspirations on what I wanted to do with my life. Once high school was over life hit me and I needed to stop being the person I was because it was getting me nowhere in life. Now that I changed my attitude and my lifestyle I now get good grades and I finally feel that I have a clear future for…
The semester before my freshman year I applied to an early college high school; I knew that I was going to have more work than if I had went to the traditional high school, but I knew I could do it. At first I was doing well, but as time went on the work became more challenging and frequent eventually my grades fell and took my pride with it. I wanted to transfer to the traditional high school in my neighborhood, but changed my mind after a talk with one of my professors. She helped me to recognize that if I quit not only would I be throwing away the work that I did do, but I’d also be preventing myself from seeing what work I could do. I took that seed of information and turned it into a tree of motivation.…
An experience that has happened to me that will help me with my goals in school would be my time in the military. While I was in the military I learned that using time wisely, making smart choices and improved my reading and writing skills. Using time wisely is one of the most important things you can do. If you waste your time you can get so far behind that you fail. I have never been a failure and don’t plan to start anytime soon.…
“I know applying to colleges is the last thing you want to do right now, but you might change your mind,” a trusted friend told me. It was December of my senior year of high school, and college application deadlines were approaching quickly. I was recovering from a major illness at the time, and wasn’t ready to think about college. My plan was to spend a year living at home and working before I pursued higher education. In the following months, my recovery progressed rapidly.…
My past laid out upon a table. My GPA, my resume, my test scores. An unfamiliar man whom I met for the first time was frowning, turning around in his creaky red chair, while hurriedly trying to contextualize my life with just a few pieces of paper. For 15 minutes, he sat there, unhappy, tapping his foot, analyzing what I’ve “done” with my life. He took a sip of water and suggested that I go to community college.…
My freshman year of college I struggled greatly with the cost of college. I had moved out of my mother’s house and was living with my grandmother. I worked a part time job of 15 hours while taking 19 hours of school. Because I did not have my own place I was still considered under my mother’s income. My mother does not make very much money.…
I'm a senior and this year was my last year is playing college soccer. My coach asked me Andrew what are your goal that you want to achieve this year I told he that my goal that I'm going to attain and achieve before I leave sage college is help my team win the skyline conference. So I work hard all summer getting myself ready for my senior year of college soccer. As the result my goal that I was attaining came throw and I helps my team we won the 2015skyline conference I feel better that I have achieved something that when I come back to sage it will be there and it will made me happy.…
As a Freshman at Lyndon State College. I was sure how things work. I get nervous when I am in class. I don’t really like talking in the class. I hate public speaking because I thought people will make fun of my English.…
Life's a journey worth taking the unbeaten path. That is why, despite looking up to my loving parents and having the utmost respect for them, I have taken a different road than they did. However, undergoing any challenge without their guiding experience can certainly prove to be an undertaking. I, a first generation college student, am the pioneer of higher education for my family. Though I join many others in lunging out into the world for the first time, I am doing so without having a father or mother to tell me how to tackle the college experience.…
All my life, I’ve been aware of the people around me and considered what I could do to make their lives more fortunate. With this interest in mind, I joined the Anti-Bulling Club (ABC) at my school in the 6th grade, eventually becoming ABC president in the 10th grade. As president, my biggest priority was to make my school a place where students were welcomed to engage in discussion unafraid of what might be said; I tried accomplishing this goal by getting volunteers to hold the doors and greet peers to school each morning. Through creating this inviting atmosphere, students participated in more constructive conversation, leading to provoking questions that even teachers could not answer. When I transitioned to community college life in the…
My community college experience. It is very important to be involved with others in community college, it’s called community college so make sure to interact with others in that community. Joanne Jacobs reports in an article interviewing Isa Adney “The secret to success is people, Adney writes. Talk to classmates. Form study groups.…
As a person who is going to be a first generation college student, my journey towards obtaining a higher education has been challenging to say the least. Neither my father or mother finished high school, but when I was very young, my mother, who struggled with alcoholism, left my father and I, and he has raised me by himself ever since. Over the course of my childhood, my father did everything in his power to make ends meet through working long hours and multiple jobs so that I could have the opportunities that he never had. Because of this, at an early age I learned to do without certain things and when I was old enough, I got a job of my own to help provide for myself and my father. As a result of these things, sometimes it was difficult to do well in school and other activities, but I always found a way to succeed through diligence and time management skills.…
As a running start student I could talk about how my experience at community college helped prepare me to transfer to a four year university, but the lessons I learned there were primarily limited to academics. Sure, I learned how to be successful in a college class room, that online classes don’t fit my learning style, and going to Hong Kong for two weeks in the middle of the quarter will significantly lower a GPA. (I eventually retook the classes from that quarter.)…
Talofa from American Samoa! I am Lusia Pereira, a college instructor at the Teacher Education Department at our community college. I recently returned to full time employment for nearly a year now, after serving in the ministry with my husband and family for twelve years. Prior to ministry work, I had served twenty years as an elementary and high school teacher in public schools. Five of which were served as a developmental English teacher at the community college.…