Below is kind of my thought process throughout making the video.
Intro
My time at UNE during my first semester has been very ieye opening. I chose to come to UNE because it was close to home, my father went there, and I felt it best fit me academically. I always had a tough time deciding on things, so I knew choosing a major was going to be very difficult for me. I was going back and forth on a couple of different majors, but nothing really caught my attention, so I went into college with an open mindset and chose to be undecided. I learned a lot of things during my first semester as an undecided college student, and I am here to tell you a little bit about my time.
First Part (commuter)
Since I only live 25ish minutes away from UNE, I decided to commute instead of living in a dorm. I had to drive 20 minutes to my high school so this wasn’t much different. Also, hearing some other students’ living situations in the dorms I couldn’t imagine myself living like they do.
Some days I’m on campus in the morning for basketball practice and then I drive back home to grab something to eat and then I’m back on campus from 11 to 5ish. So, it was definitely something I had to figure out how to manage but once I did it wasn’t a problem at all.
Being on campus and having nowhere to go besides my car and places to study also helped me get my work done. If I was living on campus and had a dorm, there’s a good chance I would just be taking naps in between my classes, but since I couldn’t do that, I was usually just doing my school work in between classes.
Second part(overall time)
At the beginning of the semester I was taking 4 classes on Mondays and Tuesdays, I went from 11 to 620 having classes with one break in between. I quickly found out that this was not going to work. In my week 1 reflection I said that having four classes in one day was something I was a little concerned about. Then, in the week 2 reflection I said “I did drop one of my classes on Monday and switched to a stats class on Tuesday. This was because of a couple of reasons. First, I didn’t feel excited about what the class was about and didn’t want to waste my time on something that wasn’t important to me. And secondly, I had four classes on Mondays and Thursday and I was thinking that it could get overwhelming later into the semester.” I am very glad that I dropped that class because I couldn’t even imagine what it would be like if I was still taking that class. I also stated in my week 2 reflection that I started playing pick up and lifting with the basketball team. This was something that helped me a lot. I had something to look forward to that day and I also started to actually meet the guys on the team and started to build connections with them.
Throughout the next couple of weeks nothing else really changed besides the workload, I finally started to get actual work and I was not ready for it. It wasn’t that the work was hard, but I was having a difficult time managing it. During high school, I always used to rely on free periods or class time to get my homework done. But, I found out in college you have to create your own time to get this work done. This was definitely something I had to get used to but after a couple of weeks, I got the hang of it.
Week 5 was the first week where I went back to UNE during the weekend to do something not basketball related, well, sort of not basketball related. I started out the day by heading over to the forum to catch some of the Men’s Basketball Alumni Game. I have been to a couple of these before because my dad played basketball at UNE, but it was a different experience being a student at UNE and watching the game. My dad didn’t end up actually playing in the game because he felt he was too old to compete with the younger guys playing in the game, and I don’t blame him because a lot of the guys playing were probably 20 years younger than him. But, I still had a great time. I then had to go volunteer at a soccer game with a couple of my teammates. We just stood on the sidelines with a soccer ball waiting to give the balls to the players in case the game ball was kicked in the woods. On my beyond class activities page I write that “This was an interesting experience, it was kind of cold and I honestly did not really have any interest in the actual game. But, because I was right next to UNE’s sideline I could hear everything the Coach was saying and since they were losing he was yelling a lot which made it kind of entertaining. This is probably something that I will not do again, but it was still a cool experience.”
Week 6-7
Weeks 6 and 7 were very stressful for me, I had a couple of papers due and a lot of homework. This was completely my fault because as I said in my week 6 reflection “I put off assignments thinking it’s gonna be ok but then all of sudden on the nights before something is due and I haven’t even started it.” This was definitely a learning curve for me, but as time went on after these two weeks I think I really improved on managing my work and time better.
Weeks 8-10
Weeks 8 9 and 10 acted almost like a break from all the school. These weeks were very low stress because I didn’t have much homework or any projects due. However, this is when I started official practice for basketball and we practice at 6 in the morning. Because I am a commuter I wake up at around 430 to wake up and eat something before heading over to UNE. This was something I really had to get used to. I’ve woken up early for work outs before, but waking up that early every single day was not something I was accustomed to. It took a couple of weeks to get used but I can say that after a few weeks it becomes a lot easier to do.
I presented my major exploration project in week 11. This was probably the most impactful assignment I have had all semester. All the assignments that I had before this one I didn’t really understand the meaning behind them, this was probably because I am undecided so I was taking a bunch of random classes. But, the major exploration project was amazing. I looked at the psychology major and learned a lot about it and because of this project I am really considering the psych. Major. In my reflection for the project I said that I was happy that “I was forced to do this process of exploring a major. This is because without this project, I would have never done anything like and would have probably just picked a major because I had to and not because I was truly interested in it.”
Week 12 to present
From week 12 to now, I have really been focusing on trying to end on a positive note. I have multiple projects due by the end of the semester and some papers and a few exams, so it has been a little stressful, but I think with all I have learned from this semester I can end a strong note.
There has been one apparent theme through this semester and that it is open to growth. With me being undecided I have to be open to a lot of new ideas and opportunities that are presented to me during my time as an undecided student. I think throughout this whole semester I have really learned a lot about myself and what I might want to be major in.
