Roosevelt University First Year Seminar

ACP 101 - section 02

-Martin Potros

My TIB essay in a nutshell said that I believe that the little things in life that we do for others are the things that make the world go round. Be it holding the door for a stranger or helping someone find where they need to go. The little things we do for each other make society better. I believe if you do just one random act of kindness each day no matter how small your outlook on the world might change quite a bit for the better.

So far at RU I've had a great time learning and getting to know the city of Chicago. The classes are engaging and require high levels of student involvement, Roosevelt clearly strives to be a school that operates like a family it seems and is a great environment to learn. I think that being here and going for higher education is paramount to success in the modern world, and that the many of the principles Roosevelt stands on are principles that this country should stand on in order to better itself. 

My “This I Believe” essay was all about second chances and living life to the fullest. My father was diagnosed with a heart failure and my family and I were told that he wouldn’t be around for long. Since that day, I made the conscious decision to do the most and get the most out of each and every day given to me and to not take important people in my life for granted. This kind of event also forced me to do a lot of growing up when I was younger but I feel like it was very good for me. It forced me to be more mature and recognize what is important in life and if something really matters, you cant let it go to waste. It became my life motto that time is precious and that is something I will truly never forget. -Claire Wilson ACP

Since I couldn't submit it to the actual tumblr page, I will be emailing my reflection. When I first graduated high school, I expected it to be just like the movies. I envisioned huge campus with lots of sororities and fraternities and crazy partying. Since I came to Roosevelt, there really isn’t much of that here. I am actually pretty grateful about that. The student-to-student contact is totally different because we live in the city. There are some students who have lived in the city their whole life and can navigate their way around every nook and cranny in the entire city. Then there are some students like me who come from very small (and usually closed minded) towns. This creates a certain type of protectiveness amongst students. We care for one another. There is always someone willing to walk you where you need to go if you’re too nervous to go alone, a sense of community. Since this is a social justice school, there are many accepting student who go here and there’s no need to be afraid of who you really are. You feel safe. I’ve been so lucky and I am so grateful to go to a school like Roosevelt in the heart of such an amazing city. Claire Wilson (ACP)

The career development counselor helped me in developing my resume. I had troubles in organizing the whole thing, she helped me in that. Also, I did not know if I should or should not put my volunteering actives on my resume, she said "volunteering work helps a ton in a resume" and a bunch of other stuff about putting volunteer work on a resume and to present legitimate detail about it. I've never had a job so she said "its completely okay" for it. Resume is for your experience and what you've done is noteworthy. 

Roosevelt has been an eye opening experience for me. I came from a small town in Wisconsin where if you did not leave at 18, you most likely were not going to leave at all. My high school lacked diversity so to come to Roosevelt where there is more diversity than I can imagine is great. The social justice aspect of the school is great, nothing like I've ever experianced. It takes some getting used to living in the city but it's been wonderful.

Many times in life we dont appreciate what we have untill we lose it. This is true with significant others, family members, friends, hobbies, pets and much more. I love baseball and have played my entire life. Senior year of high school i got kicked off my team, and was unable to finish. College has given me a chance to fufill life long dreams, and continue playing baseball.

Coming to Roosevelt, I was a pretty close minded, simple headed teenage guy that paid no attention to the surroundings that did not affect me. This class showed me the importance of creating a sustainable environment for the future. Not only that, but also gave me a clear vision of what equality and social justice actually means. Working with both of these categories showed me the importance of engaging in an important matter, being social justice or equality. These subjects are problems in our society today, and they will not be fixed until everyone realizes that there are problems within these topics. Roosevelt does a great job of making equality, social justice, and going green be heard, and taken into account with everything that is done here.

If you are thinking about a career in teaching, I would highly recommend you volunteer at a school to see how things work form a teachers point of view. This semester I spent a lot of time at the Village Learning Academy, working with a kindergarten class. Doing this really helped me realize that I want to work with children in the future, and I got the chance to actually shadow a teacher on fridays when I don't have class. It is amazing how much you can learn from just being in a school on a weekly basis. Even better, you are no longer the student, and the kids there look at you as a teacher. You get hands on experience working with little kids, and you learn new ways to deal with all kinds of situations, from ever excited kids to crying ones. Volunteering can really give you a sense of not only what you can expect as a teacher, but it can help you figure out if this is a career path you really want to follow.