Kalysha Clark: Academics

Showing posts with label Academics. Show all posts

It's official! I graduated from college (and with honors)! You are looking at a new alumnae of North Carolina State University.

I am thankful to have had such a great support system throughout my undergraduate career, including my family, boyfriend, friends, advisors and mentors. I'm glad that many of my family members were able to attend my graduation and help me celebrate!

My wonderful family

My girls

Next up on the playlist of life is serving in AmeriCorps as the Stormwater SMART Outreach Coordinator until January, at which point I'll start working toward my Master's Degree!

Today was my last day of classes for the semester. That's crazy. I just have to make it through three exams and then I am done until January!

This semester was very busy, but I had some awesome opportunities.

I got to present my summer research at the State of North Carolina Undergraduate Research and Creativity Symposium. This was my first ever professional poster presentation.

I have also been interning with The Nature Conservancy, working under Dr. Sheila Reddy, Senior Scientist for Sustainability, on a project focusing on living shorelines.

These are two amazing opportunities that I am glad to have had extended to me. I am excited to finish exams and head to NYC to visit my best friend before the holidays.

And I can't wait to see what my next (and final!) semester holds for me!

I've made it halfway through the semester! Woo!

One thing I'm doing a lot of this semester is working on projects! I thought I would take just a minute to talk about some of the ones I'm working on.

For my conservation biology class, I am a part of two group projects. One studies wildlife presence on golf courses and compares the rates at which wildlife are captured on camera traps across three different landscape types - rural, exurban, and suburban. The second project is a conservation controversies discussion. Our controversy is the Red Wolf Recovery Program, which is currently under review by the US Fish and Wildlife Program. Our discussion plans to approach the topic from a couple different stakeholder perspectives and ultimately try to answer whether we should continue or cancel the program.

I am also involved in a group project for my human-animal interactions course that will research elephant-human conflict and look at a couple ways to solve mitigate those conflicts.

In addition, I am continuing to work on my independent research project that started over the summer, which focuses on perceptual range in cliff chipmunks. I plan to present my research at the State of North Carolina Undergraduate Research & Creativity Symposium at the end of November!

Lastly, I was just given an awesome opportunity to start working with The Nature Conservancy (very exciting!!!) on a project that looks at how municipal governments talk about climate change. I'm super excited to get the opportunity to not only gain more research experience, but also get to expand my professional network.

With all that said, I'm super busy. But who isn't? I just take it one day at a time.

Wow, it's hard to believe I'm already a senior in college. My final year has come and I hit the ground running. In the first month of senior year, I've already had an exam, quizzes, group projects and more. I'm also interning with a nonprofit this semester called AniMall, which is a nonprofit retail store with a mission to save the lives of homeless animals.

I got a dog this year as well. It's been a long road and he's not perfect, but thanks to some help from the local German Shepherd Rescue, we've been able to make a lot of great changes.

I've also been involved in Roots and Shoots again this semester, which makes this my second year as Vice President. We recently got to go out with the Turtle Dogs - a couple Boykin Spaniels who find turtles to assist in research efforts.

The turtle dogs found five turtles in 2 hours. On average, one
person will spend 4 hours and find only one!

I also plan to present a research poster at the State of North Carolina Undergraduate Research and Creativity Symposium using the side project I worked on over the summer.

Needless to say, senior year will be just as busy as ever, but it will be worth it. Stay tuned for more updates! :)

I am a part of a program at NC State called Scholars Preparing for Admission and Career Exploration (aka SPACE). This program will help me get together everything I need to successfully apply for graduate school, which is importance since I will be taking a break between undergraduate and graduate school.

Personal statements are an important component of graduate school applications and so, throughout the program, I will be writing responses to the most common graduate school essays in order to put together a cohesive and unique personal statement.

Some of the essays include:

Immediate Objectives: Why do you plan to attend graduate school? Explain how graduate school will contribute to your career goals. What do you plan to do with your degree?

Career Plans:What are your long-term career goals? Where do you see yourself, career wise, ten years after graduation?

Academic Achievements: Discuss your academic background and achievements. Of which are you most proud?

Research Experiences: Discuss your research experiences.

Internships and Field Experience: Discuss your applied experiences in this field. How have these experiences shaped your career goals?

Academic Interests:What would you like to study? Describe your academic interests. What areas would you like to research?

Match to Faculty: Explain how your research interests match those of the faculty. With whom would you like to work? Who would you choose as your mentor?

Personal Experience and Philosophy: Write an autobiographical essay. Is there anything in your background that you think would be relevant to your application for admission to graduate school? Describe your life up to now: family, friends, home, school, work, and particularly those experiences most relevant to your interests in psychology. What is your approach to life?

Strengths and Weaknesses: Discuss your personal and academic skills. Identify your strengths and weaknesses. How will these contribute to your success as a graduate student and professional? How do you compensate for your weaknesses?

I cannot think of a signle person who thoroughly enjoys the process of enrolling in classes. Personally, it never fails to stress me out.

I always plan my schedule out only to find that the classes I planned are either not offered or are closed because everyone has already filled up the seats. In the case of the latter, I am always having to go back and check the portal, hoping to get lucky and hop on the wait list.

As of now, I'm enrolled in four classes: Ecology, Animal Phylogeny and Diversity, Nonprofit Leadership and Development, Explorations in Creative Writing, and Fundamentals of Grant Development for Nonprofits.

I'm disappointed because I really wanted to take Captive Animal Biology, but the class fills up quickly and it was already closed by the time my enrollment period opened.

I'm also disappointed because my original planned schedule allowed me to have only three days of classes, giving me two days to work, but it now looks as if I will have to take classes and work on every day of the week. College problems.

Hopefully, it'll all work out in the end. I'm just concerned with making sure I get all my required classes so that I can graduate on time.

Anyone else have a pleasant or unpleasant experience with enrolling? Let me know in the comments. :)

I posted a little while back reflecting on the first part of my ten week summer class. I was able to improve my test grades from the first exam and ended up making a B in the class! And to end my summer, the class successfully transferred back to State and officially shows up on my transcript! Yay.

Only another week of summer until it's back to the grind!

My goal was to take my required statistics and chemistry II at the local community college in Raleigh, but I was only able to get into chemistry. So every Monday and Wednesday I am on campus from 8:15-1:25. The class is going well though! We have open note quizzes before each lab to make sure we've looked over the material and I've made 100s on all but one (which was an 80). We also have informal lab reports, which is good considering I haven't written a chemistry lab report since high school. The one formal report we had to do has already been done and my lab partner and I made a 100 on that. Next week is oral presentation week for the lab sections. I am doing my presentation on the chemistry of depression. It's got a nice biological aspect to it so that's why I picked it.

We had our first test a week ago and I made a little lower than I hoped but hopefully now I know how to better prepare myself and plan to go by my professor's office hours beforehand. My next exam is in two weeks so hopefully I can redeem myself. I'm thinking it should be easy to maintain an A average in lab and homework, so hopefully I can pull out a B!

So, I've been a little MIA lately. But I've had a lot going on.

Where to start?

I took another visit to the Chancellor's House and got to hear the director of the NC Council for the Status of Women and got to have dinner with Mrs. Woodson, the chancellor's wife.

I contacted the director of the Nature Research Center, Dr. Meg Lowman (world-renowned rain forest canopy researcher) to see if I could take part in a mentorship with her and if there were any opportunities at the museum for me to gain experience in research. I stopped by right before Thanksgiving break and took a tour of the biodiversity lab. I ended up running into my old bio lab TA who now works at the museum and will likely be working with her come January.

I am declaring my German minor tomorrow.

I am moving off-campus for the spring semester and living in a house with my cousin (who goes to grad school here) and her roommate who is a vet student. [For those of you who have been following my blog, you know my experience last year with on-campus living was not great. I thought I'd give it another go and it was still not great.]

Next semester, I will be a Teaching Assistant for my Companion Animals class.

I hope you guys all had a wonderful Thanksgiving. I spent it with family, friends, and my boyfriend. He and I went and watched Skyfall, I also shot a gun (two actually, a 12 gauge and a 22), and my grandmother turned off the oven with the turkey in it for 2 hours without anyone noticing.

At least it makes for a good story.

Once school gets started and the classwork and homework and assignments start piling up, it can get easy to become overwhelmed. Work, class, clubs and everything else combined starts pulling at you and then you don't know which was is up.

That is why organization is key. I live by my desk calendar and planner and it makes it really easy for me to keep track of when things are due, when I have exams, when there are club meetings and all of that jazz. Below are some of my tips on how to stay organized.

1. Invest in a planner.
You will not regret this. Most of the time, you don't even have to buy one because your school likely gives them out. My university gave me two different one for free after I already had one for myself. Keep an eye out for your school to hand them out.

When using your planner, it's important to mark down dates ahead of time and to use different colors to indicate different things.

I also recommend making a "To Do" list on a sticky note for the week (or day) and keeping it in your planner to cross off as you go.

Here you can see that I have my exams and important events marked in Red, Work marked and one club in blue, a second club marked in purple and a workshop marked in pink.

You can see I've got a To Do list in my planner that I can keep track of throughout the week.

2. Use a calendar.

Wether it's a wall calendar, a desk calendar, or one on your phone/computer: USE IT!

I use a desk calendar that I bought at walmart. Again, I color code it and note events/due dates before hand. The best time to do this is when you first get your class syllabi, club calendars, etc.

Different colors mark different events/due dates.

A break down of the color code, important so that you know what means what!

3. Keep separate folders for different clubs/groups/organizations.

You don't want all of your papers crammed into one notebook or binder because when you need to find a paper for a specific club, you won't be able to. Keeping all your handouts and calendars in separate folders will allow you to easily find whatever you need. It also means you can leave it on your bookshelf until you need the specific folder so you don't have to carry it around all the time.

Four different folders for my clubs/groups.

4. Make a weekly schedule.

Most people have their weekly class schedule but I go into much more detail. For meetings that are weekly or biweekly, I include those as well, plus work and workout times.

I make a complete color-coded (surprise, surprise) schedule in Microsoft Excel. The one below is for Fall 2012.

These four small tips make a huge difference in staying organized and keeping track of your school/work/clubs. I would be lost in homework and paperwork if I didn't follow these.

There are numerous more tips on school organization, but I feel like these are four very important ones and they're easy to start with if you're just beginning.

If you know of more school-related organization tips, please comment below and share them!

Until next time!

It's that time again, folks. Time for school. It seems like summer barely had time to get started before it was over.

I have moved back into school already and will be starting classes on Thursday. Until then, I'm trying to make valuable use of my time. I am writing this blog post as I sit outside Valentine Commons - a huge and brand new (not to mention completely overpriced) apartment complex right on campus. Yesterday, I spent 11 hours helping direct parking deck traffic and move students in. The things we do to make money. And I'm back again! Working ten glorious hours on this lovely Sunday.

In other news, some of you may know that I am a big sister in the Big Brothers Big Sisters program. My little sister is starting 6th grade this year! I am only allowed to see Paris, my little; during the school year, but we planned to stay in touch via email and phone. Unfortunately that was not the case. I could not reach Paris at all and haven't gotten to talk to her since May. But l celebrate her starting a new chapter in her life, I am putting together a little gift of school supplies for her, which I am super excited about! I can't see her for another couple weeks but I'm exited for it! Before Paris and I left for summer break, we made a list of our goals for the summer. You can read my list and how it panned out in a later post, which I will link to.

Also, my cousin is now attending grad school here at NC State so I've spent the last two nights hanging out with her and have thoroughly enjoyed it! It's nice to have some family here.

Until next time,

Today in the mail, I received a note from myself that I made with one of my advisors at the beginning of the year. It read:

Dear self,

By this time, the end of the year is almost here. By this point, I hope you have achieved a few goals:

Join an organization/club (Disney Movie Club, LGBT, CSLEPS)
Plan/start to plan studying abroad & paying for it
Volunteer at various organizations/events
Make high grades in all classes
Make new friends and eat food other than Taco Bell.

Basically, by this point, you should be involved. Do things that interest you and never stop asking questions! <3

Love,

yourself-Kaly

9/13/11

Well, I'd like to think I met most of these goals! Let's break it down!

Join an organization/club (Disney Movie Club, LGBT, CSLEPS)

I joined Leadership in Action and the Chancellor's First Year Student Leadership Program (which were both application-based). I also joined Roots and Shoots.

Plan/start to plan studying abroad & paying for it

Not so much. At this point, I was still planning to graduate in 8 semesters. Later in the year, I figured that based on my two minors, I probably would take an extra semester to graduate, so that's where all of my money saving has gone to. I still want to study abroad, but I'll have to see about that.

Volunteer at various organizations/events

As a member of Big Brothers Big Sisters, I am technically volunteering an hour a week when I see my Little. In addition, I volunteered at the lake cleaning with Roots and Shoots, at Conservators' Center for an internship opportunity, and volunteered at Raleigh Rescue Mission with a group from my Nonprofits class.

Make high grades in all classes

Sorta. First semester, I made only one C and that was a C- in Chemistry. I don't have all of my grades from this semester, but I made an A in Organic Lab, an A- in English and a B in Biology. I consider those good grades. A's and B's.
Update: I actually made all A's and B's in my second semester, which brought my GPA up a little. Definitely happy about that one!

Make new friends and eat food other than Taco Bell.

Yes! I made lots of new friends! I made friends through LIA, Roots and Shoots and through other friends. While I did eat a lot of Taco Bell over the year, I had my fair share of cereal from the dining hall and also burgers from Wolves Den.

Overall, I enjoyed my freshman year. I made friends and got involved. I even met the Chancellor! Not many freshmen can say that!

It's official! Summer vacation is here. I'm finished with my freshman year in college.

I am currently sitting at home in my living room at home.

I am really excited to start working again and have the summer to (hopefully) rest a little. Plus, spend the with my boyfriend since we've ten in this long-distance relationship.

. At the beginning of the year, I met with my Pack Promise Mentor (Pack Promise is the financial aid package I get) and I made a list of my fears and goals. My mentor is going to mail it to me so I can look back on my year and see if I met my goals and overcame my fears. You can read my reflection here.

Until then,

EDIT: I added a PE and rearranged some classes to be with friends (because that's always fun and lovely). Now I'm taking 15 hours and my classes go from 10-3 with the exception of my two labs on Tuesday and Wednesday, which run from 3-5:45. I can still deal with that, though!

I've officially enrolled for my classes next Fall! I'm only taking 14 hours, which is a happy place for me. It'll enable me to have my work study job and possibly a second job in addition to babysitting. Plus, I need time for academics and clubs!

Here's what my classes are looking like:

History of Nonprofits
Animal Anatomy and Physiology
Organic Chemistry II
Introduction to Companion Animals
Step Aerobics
Anatomy Lab
Chemistry Lab

Looks like with the exception of labs, my days (as far as classes) will last from approximately 10-3!

A lot of the people who I've been around in college have said that they never had to study during high school but are having to now that they're in college. If that's the case, it can be really tough to figure out the right way to study.

I usually studied before tests and assignments in high school, but college is another level. The classes are harder and the professors usually expect more from you.

After being here for almost an entire year and taking advice from my professors, I've got a pretty good basis on how to study for tests.

Firstly, you have to know your professor. This is hard sometimes, but it is very important.

I highly suggest going to your professors' office hours. If you know your professor, you're more likely to know what to expect from their tests. For example, my chemistry professor hates nomenclature (naming molecules). On our first test, I expected a decent amount of nomenclature questions. Wrong. Had I known that he didn't like nomenclature, I would've known not to spend a lot of my time studying that.

Rewrite your notes!

This process will be different for each class, but you just have to learn how to do it. For my chemistry class, my professor writes his notes completely on the blackboard and seldom uses powerpoint for images from the book. For that class, I write my notes on notebook paper, including the outline for the lecture (which he provides at the beginning of class). After class, I staple each lecture separately and rewrite them into my notebook. I get tutoring twice a week for an hour for chemistry, so I typically wait to rewrite my notes until after I meet with my tutor. She can usually put things into simpler terms, which I can write in the margins and add to my rewritten notes. For my biology class, the professor provides skeletal notes which we fill in during class. To rewrite these, I usually reprint the whole outline, rewrite everything I already had and put things in my own words. It's really important to put things into your own words because you need to be able to actually understand what is happening. For my nonprofits class, we take notes on our laptops in a powerpoint presentation. After each class, I transfer my notes into an online flashcard maker. (I highly recommend online flashcards. Making regular ones takes so long and they're so bulky to carry. I recommend www.flashcardmachine.com. It's free and you can get the app for your phone as well.)

Another important thing about rewriting your notes is that you write down any questions you have after class/lecture so you can ask your professor/neighbor/tutor. You also need to supplement your notes. Whether you go back and read the book, watch online videos, draw diagrams, whatever helps you.

Set aside permanent time in your schedule to study.

I made an entire weekly schedule in excel that includes my classes, extracurriculars, work and study times. If something comes up and you can't study during the designated time, make sure you make up for it before it's too late!

When you're studying for a test, set aside one day of studying per topic.

That doesn't mean you have to study all day. It just means you only study that topic on that day. For example, my last biology exam consisted of Photosynthesis, Detailed Cellular Respiration and Nervous System/Communication. In that case, I set aside three days to study. One for each topic.

Bonus: Record your lectures on your phone or a tape recorder of find a good professor online who posts their lectures.

We can check out voice recorders from my school library and my biology professor lets me leave it on her desk while she lectures. She even presses the record button for me! As far as online lectures, www.kahnacademy.org is a good one that covers many subjects.

Hopefully you guys can utilize these tips to help you review your notes and study for exams. Good luck!

Kalysha Clark

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