Freshmen Week New

Posted by Breyona Colley at Sunday, August 28, 2011 12:48:34 AM EDT

Freshmen week was literally not what I had expected at all. I expected to come to campus meet a bunch of people and have nothing to do all day except sit in orientations and tutorials but it was not nothing like that. I imagined there would be very few activities for us to take part in or time for us to really get to know one another. I assumed we would meet professors and advisors and other students along the way but I never even could have came to the conclusion of what freshmen week honestly was. My freshmen week was an experience that I will never be able to forget. Within two days of being here I am sure that I have have met four friends that I will be friends with and close to long after my days at Howard. We had met each other Monday night at Fur and have been inseperable ever since. Every time we meet someone knew and we go through that normal questioning what's your name? Where are you from? What's your major? Where do you stay? and many other questions that lead into other conversations, we are always replied with, "So did you guys know each other before coming to school? You seem like you have known each other a long time." But we always simply reply, no we just met each other, with a smile on our faces. Freshmen week I was honestly scared of. I was coming from out of state, just like many other students, but I just had this mindset of not knowing anyone and scared of having to start all over with making friends and being in a city where I know absolutely no one and the closest person I do know, is two hours away. I had all these emotions and thoughts running through my head and coming to Howard changed all of those perceptions. Freshmen week was a time where we had no worries and was a time to get to know our classmates and gain friendships that can and will stick with us for the rest of our lives. As for Freshmen Seminar I don't know what to expect. Going to orientation and walking around the campus and talking to upper class-men about certain classes you really do hear the opinion of this class being completely pointless. But when sitting in the class it seems that it is going to challenge me intellectually and make me think about things in a way I never thought of. As well as to challenge things I know and see how much about them I really do know. This class seems like it is going to help me to obtain information a different way and make me look at things in life a new way and give certain things a brand new meaning, one that without this class I would have never received. My dad is very big on black history and the history of our people, but with me being Puerto Rican as well he looks at both sides of our ancestry and learns all of the things he can. He is very interested in both sides of his and my heritage, and with that it keeps me in the loop and interested. So with that I have always had a great interest in my history and knowing where I come from and the history of my people. So I think that this class will help to spike this interest that I have and only to increase it. I look forward to what this class brings and the thought process it will provoke. The goals I hope to achieve in life are very simple. 1.) I want to be great at whatever I do. 2.) I want to understand every aspect of life, I want to be able to connect with whatever my patients are going through and be able to help. and 3.) No matter what I do with my life I want to know where I came from, where I am going and have a plan set forth on how to get there. I hope that this class can bring all of my goals to life or at least help to achieve them. I now that I want to be a doctor and I know that I love the human mind and I know that people from all walks of life think differently and conceptualize things in a different manner and I want to be able to connect no matter what walk of life people are from. I have very high expectations for this class and I can only anticipate it with high hopes and an open mind and positive outlook when walking into the class. As for the previous week being my first week of classes, I enjoyed it. It was what I originally thought it to be, I assumed I would walk into class sit down and begin to take notes on subjects some I am familiar and others that are brand new to me, but either way I would have an open mind to what is being said and try and grasp the material. I can say I assumed I would struggle with math as I did all through high school and I was right about that as well. I was also on the right track for assuming that this class would challenge me intellectually. The first, or one of the first assignments, was to research one of the names on the list given and create a name that exemplifies them and something they have accomplished. I came up with the name Locke's Seldom Traveled Rhodes for our group name because after reading his biography over some of the other's I realized that there was something that really interested me. The name itself was constructed obviously of his name but the Rhodes seldom traveled was talking about his mindset and the way that he thought of things about this world that many do not even understand, specifically talking about his three idealism's of value and valuation, cultural pluralism, and race relations. He believed that each culture group has its own identity and it is entitled to protect and promote it. In the particular context of America, the claim to cultural identity need not conflict with the claim to American citizenship. And with me being born and raised in Puerto Rico I am very proud of that heritage as well as my African American side. So it was interesting and touching for me to read that he believed that no matter where you come from you shall always have that identity of where you are from and you should always proudly flaunt and never forget it and that does not conflict with the fact that you are also proud to be an American as well. The word "roads" was spelled the way it was because of him being a Rhodes scholar and to me that was a key piece as to of why he continued to look into the things he did and that's why I felt it to be important in implementing it into the title or name of the group. My expectations for Howard are high and I can only say they will have been, will be or won't be met by experiencing life to the fullest and enjoy the time spent here and I am looking forward to every minute of it. :) Brey