Hey guys
It’s Lay
So originally I had another blog post planned but I reorganized my blog content list for the rest of the year, so that blog post got pushed back. While I was planning, I realized that because I skipped a week I had to fix my content list in order to still have a life update. I am continuing to do school this semester because I felt like that’s what was right for me. I’ve been seeing a lot of videos or blog posts or people that I know in my real life, saying they decided to either take a break from school until in-person sessions happen or they don’t want to go back. There are many factors why a person won’t back whether it’s they can’t learn virtually, it’s too much pressure/ stress, they don’t enjoy it, they want to venture out to start their own business, etc. School just isn’t for everyone and whatever a person’s reason is valid.
I personally always liked school because I do like learning and I feel like I chose the right major for me to stick with it. So obviously I can’t speak for everyone so this post will kinda be more like a life update.
What classes are you taking?
SC253: Ecology
AC221: Publicity workshop
DD118: Environment and experiences
DM 211: Direct marketing
HA 112: Art history Renaissance- Modern
HI 202: History Civil war-Present
AC 272: Research methods
Yep, I’m taking 7 classes. Because I wanted to start my minor since I don’t have much to do now. Like when I had to go to school it would include me waking up early, getting ready to look presentable, rushing you get to the train station, sitting on the train for at least 1hr and 10 minutes, arriving early enough so I can get breakfast and eat and completing homework for another class while waiting for people to come because I usually was one of the first people there.
How is it different from your other semester?
So from a commuter’s perspective being home for online school is physically less exhausting because I remember how exhausted I was my first semester to a point that it affected my grades. The 2nd semester, I only did 4 in-person classes and 2 ONL classes (ONL classes you just read /watch the content they tell you, do what they say for an assignment, post on a discussion board, etc.) This semester I decided to do more ONL classes because they are less structured than lecture classes, I can do them as fast as possible and the way we participate provides less anxiety for me. I mainly like lecture class in person because you get to engage more with the professor and make new connections and friendships among students. I had a feeling we weren’t going back this semester because being a business major it’s much easier to do remote learning than the art & design students because their work is more hands-on while specifically for my major is completely strategic, uses more data, and research than creativity (although some classes use creativity). Video lectures I find draining because we listen to someone for 3 hours in our homes where it’s much more comfortable and we have to do work following the class that is just as time-consuming. Regular lectures we used to do 1hr 30 minutes of lecture and then do work for the class the remaining time so we wouldn’t have to do much outside of class besides reading the textbook and take notes but now it’s completely different doing video lectures. I just find it better to do ONL classes at this time because besides school I’m working on many personal projects but I’ll get into that after.
Explain what each course is like
The 3 video lecture classes I’m taking are: Ecology, publicity workshop, and Environment & experiences
The other 4 are ONL classes. I’m just going to give my current opinion on them but it’s still early in the semester. This is about week 3 out of the 15 weeks so the workload is still calm but once it gets closer to midterms and everything after that is usually when it gets stressful.
Ecology is that class that I feel like many of the material is review because I haven’t learned anything precisely new yet. What we mainly learned about so far is the impact of other groups on other groups (like wolves in yellow stone), cause and effect on things in the environment, evolution, natural selection, etc. I remember a lot of the material from living environment class, so I’m more excited about getting into topics I’m really interested in like global warming, pollution, sustainability, etc. I’m not highly a science person but those topics are ones I don’t remember talking much about so those topics will be exciting to learn.
Next, publicity workshop is one of my major courses so automatically I’m a lot more interested. I do think this is going to be one of my hardest classes but like one that’s really engaging that I can use to apply it to things like this blog and my YouTube. It also seems really beneficial to my career. So it’s one of the classes I’m nervous about because the content is completely new so doing in person would’ve been a lot better but I’m really excited about it always.
Environment & experiences I actually have the day I’m writing this. This is actually my minor course but I really wanted to start my minor this semester because I didn’t get the option to last semester. This class is really creative and generally, stuff I like doing so I’m really happy about this class. It would’ve been better to do in person because the assignment is really interactive with a lot of interviewing and researching but the professor was really understanding of how hard those things maybe during these times of a pandemic and modified what his project was.
Now on to ONL classes
Direct marketing is very interesting. I have a huge interest in marketing so I feel like that's what makes it enjoyable. I also think the professor tries to make the course as engaging as possible so he usually likes us to watch something and analyze it. The professor also gives good feedback which is very beneficial to me. Additionally, the class schedule is pretty easy to follow. He gives us a unit every 2 weeks on Monday. By Thursday of the first week, you need to post on the discussion board. By Sunday of the first week, you have to do part 1 of an assignment. By Thursday of the second week, you have to respond to 2 people on the discussion board. By Sunday of the second week, we have to do part 2 of the assignment. Personally, I feel like the workload for this class is fair.
Art history out of all my classes is the least stressful. We only have to read and watch the material given for the week, answer the weekly reflection (and I don’t think we have to reply to each other because she didn’t ask us to and since no one has replied to each other’s thread it ) and she only does 2 essays (one for the midterm and one for the final). The only thing is I heard she takes long to put in grades which makes me a little anxious.
Regular history also seems like a light class. The professor gave us the link to the textbook so we wouldn’t have to buy it. I was always good at history so I’m not too worried about this class but so far the days he posts the assignments had been really inconsistent and it throws my schedule off a bit.
The final class I have is research methods and I don’t have much opinion on this class. It's fairly easy but time-consuming because there’s a lot of freedom in terms of when people submit work it can be annoying. I work in advance so I don’t have to worry about certain classes but many people put it off until the day before it’s due or the day of. We have to write summaries based on other students' replies but if people take long then I can’t finish up my work early.
So what is your overall experience of being a college student during a pandemic?
With all that being said, you can see that I like to stay booked and busy. That is why low key this has been more of a positive experience in comparison to other people. I have more time to do things like this blog and my youtube. Last year especially I went long periods without posting because it was too much to handle with everything. This year I am managing to do more for my blog and start my youtube channel. Starting a youtube channel is its own process and there's definitely a difference in content. Actually it's crazy that my youtube is turning 6 months old this month. I actually am proud of myself for starting this so please be sure to check out my channel because that's where I post more of my fun videos like makeup ideas, fashion, and story times.
I wake up the same time as if I was going to school but instead I workout (but if I’m sore from my last workout, I’ll do homework), I eat much healthier and I have more time to actually look at what I need to do.
I can‘t say it’s stressful for me because I’ve always done online school but it certainly changed my lifestyle to be more productive and less burned out. I personally think I was more likely to get burned out going to school because traveling back and forth to school, having a social life, studying, doing assignments, doing a group project while trying to grow a presence on social media, create content for my blog and YouTube, etc. my mental and physical health would be out the window.
I do miss my old lifestyle in some way but I also think doing online school and having life slowed down a bit just helped me out a lot in terms of not overwhelming myself. It’s still too early in the year for me to talk about how I’m doing in school and stuff because it’s only the third week (about to be the fourth week) which is so insane to me. College is only 15 weeks per semester plus having holidays off so my last days of classes are on December 21st because I have Monday classes, but all the other classes will most likely end before that.
So that's all for today, I hope you find this interesting. Personally, I'm just vibing but other college students may have it difficult if: they need a physical setting to focus, there is a large difference in time zones, they can't afford resources like textbooks, there are many distractions at home and so many more reasons. Just be respectful to other people’s choices and not judge them harshly because they do something out of the normal for you. That’s all for today: have a good day, evening, or night and stay healthy and safe.
I hope you'll come back next Saturday for more content.
Until next time,
xoxo Lay 💋
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