I graduate in nine days. It's surreal to think that four classes and three finals are all that stand between me and the end of my undergraduate career. Unlike some of my friends, this is not the end of school for me. I'm really excited to be starting the next phase of my life at HUC. But the Penn State chapter of my life is almost ever. It's hard to believe that four years has gone by so quickly.
It feels like yesterday when I was complaining about living in an all girls dorm in East, the furthest possible building from anything on campus except the BJC and Beaver Stadium. Freshman year, it took five minutes just to get out of my quad. I remember my first week when I downloaded a map of Penn State onto my phone so it wouldn't look like I was a lost freshman when I was a lost freshman. I didn't want to be one of the newbies carrying around a map as I got lost on my way to class. So I carried my phone and got lost anyways. One day I was wandering around campus and managed to find my way down near the nuclear reactor. After that excursion, I quickly learned how this campus was laid out.
Sophomore year, I moved into sorority life. No I did not join Greek life, I just lived one floor below and above them. I could hear them clacking in the stairwells as they got ready to go to a party and I could hear them in their common rooms as they practiced initiation rituals. It certainly was an experience. Sophomore year, I was finding my groove. I was a member of the Hillel student board, a teacher at Brit Shalom, a member of the PLA, and on a THON committee. I was getting involved and finding my niche at PSU.
Junior year was a challenge, I had just changed my major, spent a trying and course-loaded semester without my boyfriend who was studying abroad, and learned that my dad was fighting cancer. I changed during the summer between sophomore and junior year. I had many new challenges thrown in my face and had to learn in a short amount of time how to handle them in my own way. I grew up a lot that summer. And the beginning of junior year I had to again figure out how to handle these struggles in front of my friends. I wasn't the same easy-going girl they had left three months earlier. I was scarred and scared, nervous and emotional, while trying to put on a brave face.
Senior year was kind of a break. Things were working out with my family. I had a plan for graduate school. I was working on my thesis. My classes were not so hard. This semester is one of the lightest semesters I've taken at Penn State. I have two days off without classes and am only taking four classes MWF, three of which are freshman level courses. Most of my friends are stressed trying to complete end of the semester assignments while I'm sitting here, reflecting on my time at Penn State and trying to make the most of the nine days I have left here.
It has been an incredible journey and if I could do it again, I wouldn't change anything, because all of my experiences, the good, the bad and the ugly have all made me who I am today. I would not be the person writing to you right now if weren't for Hillel, Brit Shalom, and the PLA. As you can read in my various essays and blog posts, these organizations have shaped my Penn State career into something that I will cherish forever.
For the Glory
It feels like yesterday when I was complaining about living in an all girls dorm in East, the furthest possible building from anything on campus except the BJC and Beaver Stadium. Freshman year, it took five minutes just to get out of my quad. I remember my first week when I downloaded a map of Penn State onto my phone so it wouldn't look like I was a lost freshman when I was a lost freshman. I didn't want to be one of the newbies carrying around a map as I got lost on my way to class. So I carried my phone and got lost anyways. One day I was wandering around campus and managed to find my way down near the nuclear reactor. After that excursion, I quickly learned how this campus was laid out.
Sophomore year, I moved into sorority life. No I did not join Greek life, I just lived one floor below and above them. I could hear them clacking in the stairwells as they got ready to go to a party and I could hear them in their common rooms as they practiced initiation rituals. It certainly was an experience. Sophomore year, I was finding my groove. I was a member of the Hillel student board, a teacher at Brit Shalom, a member of the PLA, and on a THON committee. I was getting involved and finding my niche at PSU.
Junior year was a challenge, I had just changed my major, spent a trying and course-loaded semester without my boyfriend who was studying abroad, and learned that my dad was fighting cancer. I changed during the summer between sophomore and junior year. I had many new challenges thrown in my face and had to learn in a short amount of time how to handle them in my own way. I grew up a lot that summer. And the beginning of junior year I had to again figure out how to handle these struggles in front of my friends. I wasn't the same easy-going girl they had left three months earlier. I was scarred and scared, nervous and emotional, while trying to put on a brave face.
Senior year was kind of a break. Things were working out with my family. I had a plan for graduate school. I was working on my thesis. My classes were not so hard. This semester is one of the lightest semesters I've taken at Penn State. I have two days off without classes and am only taking four classes MWF, three of which are freshman level courses. Most of my friends are stressed trying to complete end of the semester assignments while I'm sitting here, reflecting on my time at Penn State and trying to make the most of the nine days I have left here.
It has been an incredible journey and if I could do it again, I wouldn't change anything, because all of my experiences, the good, the bad and the ugly have all made me who I am today. I would not be the person writing to you right now if weren't for Hillel, Brit Shalom, and the PLA. As you can read in my various essays and blog posts, these organizations have shaped my Penn State career into something that I will cherish forever.
For the Glory
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