Grading System - Self Report

As I approach the last blog post of the semester, I just want to self-grade myself on my college balance as hopefully you can take a few pointers out of my junior year experience. 



Every semester I have had at USC has had a different theme to it. My fall semester was all about work. As I stated in my “hello world” blog post I struggled my time management as I was working 30+ hours a week and trying to maintain a full course load. With that it was hard to keep my social
life as other activities were prioritized.

It took me some deep thinking over that winter break to

realize that college should be both a fun experience and a time to learn
responsibility. Well I certainly put myself to the test during my spring
semester… 

So without further ado here is my college balance grading…

(Feel free to try this yourself!) Grades are scaled 1-5



Class Attendance: 4

            For the first eight weeks on the semester I managed to not miss one class! Not only did that help me retain the course information, but also I felt more active and busy walking around campus and going to class. Towards the end of the semester I started to sporadically miss a few classes which is why I give myself a 4/5. My philosophy has always been, if you’re paying tuition, might as well attend class.



Social Life: 5

            Yes and I know, 5 seems like an awesome grade to give to yourself for a social life, but compared to last semester, any sort of human interaction was an improvement. Since my classes end at 3pm everyday I was able to successfully get my work done in order to have free time a night. I stayed in contact with friends more often and even explored LA with them to go hiking, dinner, movies, etc. A good social life also keeps your mental state at ease and takes your mind off the struggles of school. 



Exercise: 4

            I am known to be an exercise fanatic so a 4 may sound good to most people but for me this is a little of a drop off. I managed to exercise at least five days a week, but I usually enjoy some sort of physical activity 6-7 days a week. The reason for this drop off is that my weekends got busier do to social life activities and traveling. It’s not like a gained weight or anything, it’s just that I would’ve liked to workout more. My fall semester schedule will allow me to workout in the morning rather then the afternoon when I’m tired after class. 



Studying:  3

            My ability to study took a slight dive in the spring semester, partly due to my course load. A lot of my classes required more written assignments rather then study memorization. Therefore there were fewer nights I spent scrambling lecture notes to retain in my head. However I still maintained my decent grades so all is good! Next semester will be more studying that’s for sure! 



Family Time: 5

            I know we are away at college but that doesn’t mean you can’t get good quality family time! My dad lives close by in Santa Monica so I got a few opportunities to visit over the weekends; it always feels great to be home every now and then. I also managed my time walking to campus by occasionally giving me relatives back east a phone call, it’s a great way to catch with the fam, and it makes the walk go quicker. 





Overall my grade results in a B. This is considered a success for me, as I am very happy with my college balance. IF you really think about it, it’s very difficult to maintain straight fives. Try out your own grading system and see where you stand on the balance spectrum for this semester! 

Voice Post

While scrolling through the Internet in search of a blogger with a strong voice, I came across Irene Medina who used her blog posts to chronicle her experiences as a first year student at Florida Atlantic University.

As with most freshman, your first year can be a time of learning about the college life…we have all been there. But with Irene, I was quite fascinated how her strong diction grasped the readers’ attention to understand her point of view. Through a comedic way, Irene turns a stressful situation of dealing with college, to a more fun way to learn from past experiences.

One of her blog posts that I loved was titled The Stressful Life of a freshman. This immediately grasped my attention to which I had to click and compare her stressful life to myself.

To my amazement, our stress is due to similar things, as I’m sure all college students deal with.

Irene begins this blog with a long list of her daily schedule, activities, classes, and assignments she must complete. By exposing her daily schedule, Irene put the reader in her shoes, as most students would develop empathy towards Irene’s hardships.

However, Irene doesn’t create a sad mood in her blogs, she ads some light to it with comedic thoughts. Some of her sentences are italicized as she makes sly remarks to counteract her stressful statements. An example is seen below:

5:00 p.m. - I’m stuck in traffic, I’m way past deadline and I haven’t thought about my new blog yet. I guess sleep is out the window tonight. Hello doubleshot espresso.

Irene does maintain her realism in the blog. She understands her stress is a major issue, but she tries to include the reader in her journey through the year in a “we’re all in this together” sense. Through the use of words like “we” and “us” she makes it about everyone, not just her. An example of this is seen here:

That is the biggest problem with us freshmen: we don’t know how to manage time. Therefore, we’re more prone to stress than more than some upperclassmen who have probably already figured out the system of getting things done on time and not stressing out.

At the end of the blog post she lists a bunch of alternatives to cope with stress. In a way she ends the blog post in a positive way to promote healthy thinking and a better outlook on college. In one of here alternatives she wrote:

4. Play your favorite video game — It’s Wii time!

This creates excitement for the reader. Not that it’s cool to play video games but even though she experiences so much stress, she still maintains positive light on the situation and is portrayed as “happy.”

Below is the link to her The Stressful Life of a freshman blog post: http://faufreshman.blogspot.com/2007/11/stressful-life-of-freshman.html

Another blog post written by Irene that caught by eye is called Collegitis. It’s comedic that she came up with the word of  “Collegitis” and it immediately resonates with readers as being similar to “Senioritis” – which is the procrastination of a senior year high school student who is ready to graduate… for those of you who didn’t know.

The reader gets to understand Irene’s sense of humor when she calls “Collegitis” the evil older sibling of “Senioritis.”

She uses figures of speech to describe the severity of her procrastination symptoms. Read below to see what I am talking about:  

I’ve come to the conclusion that my procrastination is killing me. Not only is it hurting my grades and my studies, but I’m wasting money and time. 

Her mood makes it seems like that “Collegitis” is a disease. It’s like Irene created a webmd.com article about the signs and symptoms of “Collegitis.”

Even towards the end of her blog she provides her “remedy” to overcome “Collegitis.”  Her list of remedies creates a step-by-step guide for students to follow, almost as if she is a doctor and knows how to cure “ Collegitis.”

 Even tough her dialogue is informative; she does it in a very comedic sense of college humor. Most students can easily relate to her struggles and procrastination moments. To end her blog she wraps up the post on a funny note when she says:

“I hope you found these tips helpful. Next time, I’ll be the one at the library studying rather than on Facebook adding people.”

She takes the serious matter of her “Collegitis” and lightens up the mood in which she expresses a way to improve herself.

Here is the full link to Irene’s “Collegitis” blog post: http://faufreshman.blogspot.com/2007/10/collegitis.html

Irene’s blogs contain many situational experiences that students deal with throughout college. Her mood and sense of humor really harnesses the attention of the reader. I definitely suggest you read a few more of her blog posts. Perhaps you will find a common scenario that you have dealt with before.