A Busy but Fun Second Week

I have had an eventful second week. Not surprisingly, I've been pretty busy with homework, especially at the beginning of the week. I had to make graphs in Excel for stats, and took me FOREVER! This resulted in my getting behind with reading for other classes, particularly English. My professor was back Monday, so now I have to stay on top of my short stories. Fortunately, I got all my assignments done when I needed to get them done (:

On Thursday, I submitted my Workshop Leader Application. If you don't go to UP, you are probably wondering what a Workshop Leader is. For the first 10 weeks of the year, the freshman take a no-credit class where they learn things like studying for tests, transportation, campus life, registration, and other information that is important in being a college student. These workshops are taught by upper class students, and the students in the workshop share a class (the people in my workshop were in my communications class). I just had to answer a lot of questions and get three recommendations (RA, com. professor, workshop leader). I'll have my interview next month, but I won't find out if I got the position until March. Wish me luck!

On Friday, my friend Megan left for the Netherlands. She's going to be an au pair there for a year. She is one of my closest friends and I'm sad that I won't get to see her when I come home for breaks. ): She has been trying to get an au pair job for over a year, so I'm really happy that she finally found a job. She's not going to have a phone, but we'll keep in touch via Facebook and email.

Yesterday I went downtown to Llyod Center with some friends. The Llyod Center is a huge mall in downtown Portland with many fabulous stores, plus a food court, movie theater, and an ice skating rink. Our first stop was Claire's, where my friend Dana got her ears pierced. My friend MacKenzie also bought me a crown and sash that I'm going to wear on my birthday (I'll have pictures for my birthday next week).


When I woke up this morning, I looked outside my window to see SNOW! It was just an inch, but it was so pretty and an unusual sight for this Cali girl. Here's what it looks like from my room.


Anyways, my birthday is on Thursday and my family is coming here on Saturday. I'll have more to say about these events then. Until next time!

First Week Back!

I've been back a week, and it's been an exciting but busy week. I can't believe I'm back on the Bluff after a month off. I am thrilled that I get to see my friends every day, but I could do without homework. So far, I really like my classes and professors. I'm taking Theology, Stats, English, Human Bio, and Cross Cultural Psych. I'm also in Choral Union, which is one credit but all you have to do is show up and you get an A! Plus, I have it with two of my friends and we're singing Broadway songs (including Hairspray!), which I'm psyched about.

My friends (this week MacKenzie, Megan, and Cady) are getting into going to the gym with me. I try to exercise 5-6 days a week, and I'm much more motivated when I have friends with whom I can excercise. My friends are excited to work out, which of course, gets me excited too!

This week the Freshman Resource Center had applications for Workshop leaders, so I picked one up am currently working on it. Hopefully, I'll have the wonderful opportunity of helping freshman get adjusted to college. :D

Anyways, here are the highs and lows of my classes.

Theology: The first of my three theology classes covers world religions. Since I went to Catholic school, this class is basically what I did in the spring of my junior year. It shouldn't be too hard. My professor is a priest (and a Bay Area native!), but he told us the first day that he is interested in other religions and is not a biblical literalist. Right now we're just discussing the basics of religion.

Stats: Stats is my first and last math course here at UP. I'm NOT a math person, so this is good news for me. However, as a psychology major, it is essential that I can understand statistics (even though I'm not going to do research). Right now we're just learning about studies and how to conduct surveys. We have to do a group project (3 people per group) where we do a survey and collect data. This class seems hard, but so far, Dr. Niederhausen (my prof) seems really nice and knows what she is talking about. I haven't had good math teachers since middle school, so I'm happy to finally have a good teacher for a difficult subject. Also, I've met some people in my class who I hope to have study parties with :D

English: I took AP Lit in high school, so the class I'm taking now is the equivalent to my high school class. Unfortunately, I did not score high enough to place out, so I was bummed when I found out I had to take it again. Although it would have been nice to have one less class, I love English so I don't mind that I have to take it now. Also, two aspects make this class great: my friend Dana and I have it together and our professor is AWESOME! He spent about half of our class telling us stories about himself. Unfortunately, I only had this class Monday because our prof has been sick. ): I'll tell you more about it once I have more classes.

Human Bio: I'm not a science person, but I have to take 2 science classes as part of the core requirements to graduate. Luckily, UP gets that not everyone is a science person, so they offer "SCI" classes, which are classes for nonscience people and don't have labs. I'm interested in the human body/health, and the topics we're going to cover seem interesting. However, it's going to be hard because the power points are really detailed and cover every little detail of the different systems (right now its the endocrine and reproductive systems). Also, the 2 power points were 25 and 40 pages each, and my prof emailed them to us at 7 pm the night before the class (which is at 8:10 ):). My prof's a cool guy; it's just that I don't understand everything he puts in his power points. Hopefully, a visit during office hours or questions in class while clear up my confusion. Luckily, I've found people who are just as confused as I am who would be great study buddies.

Cross Cultural Psych: This class essentially studies psychological and social differences between cultures. I took intro to psych and sociology last year, so there's some overlap. We don't have tests (except the final), just quizzes every week. We also have projects and presentations which should be interesting. My prof does not lecture the whole time (unlike my prof last semester), and she's super friendly and enthusiastic about the subject material.

Anyways, that's all for now. Until next time!