Late Christmas gift that was earned

I am so thrilled to tell you that I have achieved something that I did not think I would achieve. In the fall semester, I have been documenting the fact that this was my hardest semester yet. This semester was definitely the most writing extensive which I do not mind but I really had to focus on the goals that the writings had required of me. At times in the fall semester, I did not know that I was going to succeed. Here I am in my Winter Break and a late Christmas gift has been bestowed upon me. Like a child waiting for Christmas to arrive so he or she can tear their presents open, I waited on my Fall semester 2008 grades to become available to me this very day. I awoke around eight this morning and the first thing on my mind was the grade report. I turned the computer, went to the site and looked around. I was in shock at first. Then the shock subsided and the feelings of joy, happiness, relief, and satisfaction entered my body. The reason: my first ever Dean's List. I never thought that I would reach it at least in my undergraduate career.

Let me sum up my feelings about each of the classes. These comments are entirely and should not be taken out of context. These comments are to serve as a hint for prospective and current students who choose to take these classes in the Fall of 09 or beyond.

Choral Art Society

My 5th consecutive time I have taken the class. I am sad to part with the program in the Spring but after this semester's double drumming of Choral Art and Opera, I think I have earned the break from Choral Art. The song selection this semester had a lot of variety although I wish we should travel more to the community. Hopefully, something like this will happen in the near future. The membership has grown since last year and that is a plus and I think the membership will continue to grow in the near future. All of the members seemed dedicated to providing their vocal talents and I am glad that I was a part of the program in the fall.

Opera

My appreciation for Operatic Theater has grown tremendously. I learned a lot in the three months we had together. In a way, I cannot believe how well we did the scenes program in such a short amount of time. In another way, we worked incredibly hard to make sure that everything went well so I am not that surprised that we pulled it off. I learned a lot about myself vocally and theatrically. Opera was 100x more challenging that anything I did through Choral Arts Society not just because of the shortness in time but the amount of time I had to put in Opera especially in its final three weeks before the shows. Not only did I have to sing (and sing well) but I had to do some basic ballet steps, act, and learn stage directions. I remember sitting in the Green Room and wondering why am I doing this. The reason: to push myself and to experience something that I never have done before. Overall, I love the Opera program that Ohio Wesleyan has and we really have some shining stars that could have a long and successful career in that field if they wanted. I am truly glad that I did Opera this semester.

Civil Rights and Liberties (Politics and Government)

This is easily my hardest class of the semester. The only reason I took the class was that I needed to fulfill a requirement for my Urban Studies major. In addition, none of the other classes I wanted to take for the major was offered in the fall so I decided to man up and take the class. Another factor weighing against me was that I have never taken a Politics and Government at Ohio Wesleyan. I took one at Kenyon when I was a JUNIOR in HIGH SCHOOL (yes, I never officially went to Kenyon, I just took the course through a Kenyon certified teacher). When I saw my first exam score, it was average but I knew that my peers were doing better because many of them were Politics and Government majors. Nevertheless, I had to really motivate and push myself in order to get a better grade especially in the next couple of weeks where half of my total grade would be determined from a term paper, case briefs (think Roe v. Wade or Frontiero v. Richardson), and the last of three exams. I think that the open book and open notes last exam helped me in the end. I learned a lot about dissents and concurrences as well as different kinds of scrutiny to determine case that involve race, gender, and age. I also learned more than I wanted to about my term paper topic: Exceptions to the Miranda Rule. Looking at all of those government sources and becoming the library's slave for day's on end. Even though the grade matters, I think I learned more than what the grade on the paper (by the way, it is a C+) says. I am glad I took the course even though I would not like to repeat it through something like Constitutional Law. I will leave that up to the Politics and Government majors and minors.

Cartography and Visualization (GIS)

Behind Civil Rights and Liberties, this was the second most difficult just for the mere fact of its extreme tediousness. I will like to think of myself as detail-oriented but man...this class took a tremendous amount of time. I learned a lot of HTML and a little bit of CSS in the class. I had to learn a great deal in about fifteen weeks- different computer languages, different downloadable programs to build my website, programs to create my maps for Oklahoma, programs to create my animation of those maps, programs to make my website transparent, and all other types of other kinks to make my project of creating a functional website with all of the elements of a working animation of population change in Oklahoma through over one hundred years. There were some small things that really irked me throughout the project like the neatline we had to create to put the map in. To me, it is a good skill to have and note but in some cases, it was rather superfluous. No offense but if I had to do it again, I would skip the process of creating a neatline altogether. I like the bare background better. Anyway, despite the tedious process, I am a first-timer in creating websites and animations so this gave me practical experience (and something to add as a great resume builder). I know that I can utilize these newly acquired skills in the near future because a lot of the things we learned is really practical and with time, you can master these skills.

Environmental Geography

I love this class. This class is so cool and beneficial for sustainability. I created a Google Earth depiction of some of the places on campus where there was green space available to the general public. I never how much green space there was on campus until I started this project. Hoepfully, I can continue this project as it is very practical for recreation and research , whatever floats your boat. I hope to help my successor in the class understand the project and make its development and availability to people on-line a success. On the seminar side of things, this is the one class where even though I am not an expert I will put my two cents in. I like to talk about the environment because the environment effects me. The small amount of people in the class helped spark lively conversations. Sometimes, it was me and the professor and sometimes it was me and a couple other students. I am bound to link some of the material I learned in this class with Cartography in my next class in the spring, Geographic Information Systems. I believe that this class is a must-take, although it is hard to get into if you are a sophomore or a freshman.

The World's Cities/Urban Geography

To tell you the truth, I was not at all confident about how well I would perform in this class or how much I would take from it. Now that the semester is over with, I am so happy I took the class and that it is a part of my major. I understood cities already but I incorporated what I knew already into the theories and the different formulae of how cities across the country was built. I learned a lot in the class because not only did the professor provide a lot of information, he was able to bring a lot of other people to talk about the perspective of how cities were built. The perspective came from professors and students alike. Even though the class can be often frenetic, I did not have trouble keeping up in the class. I started slow in the class but I started to understand the subject matter in each class and really started to put the information in the lectures together with the immense amount of Eres material on-line that was the required reading. Even though I had to print off article after article after article week after week and I went through TWO 400-sheet ($20 each) limits on my account, I was glad I had them in the final weeks. I had the heaviest work load in the final two or three weeks in this class. I had a term paper about Delaware's morphology as a rapidly growing city, a presentation about the culture of Chicago, and my final exam that dealt highly with Latin American Cities and architectural design. I was happy with the result in the class and I know that I can use these projects as a jumping start to another projects in the near future. This near future is as soon as January 12 when I begin my Seminar/Capstone (as I like to call it) class in Geography, Contemporary American Landscape. I enjoyed the field trips and I want them to stay on the syllabus for a requirement for the class. The field research in Columbus and Delaware was really cool and I familiarized myself with those areas quite well from the trips. If you like an eclectic type of class that is not all one type of instruction, the World's Cities is a class you might want to take for an upper level class.

Race and Ethnicity (Sociology/Anthropology)

I love this class. I kind of wish that the professor was not leaving after the spring semester but it is what it is. I enjoyed my time with him and the format of the class. For some, it is boring and sonewhat useless. For me, it was an experience. I did not mind all of the writing (about 60 single space pages). Learning and immersing myself into the countries and all of their ethnic battles was something that I will not easily forget. The term paper in this class: Native Americans- Victims or Beneficiaries was something that I wanted to do for a very long time. When I got the opportunity, I researched and eagerly jumped into the causes and effects and some potential solutions. I was so excited about the paper that I almost finished it at home during the Thanksgiving break. This was a class that I was actually excited to attend almost every week. Like the Civil Rights and Liberties class, I only picked it because it was required for my Urban Studies major and it was one of the only available classes for the Urban Studies major in the fall semester. Nevertheless, I was glad to take the class and I would like to take a similar class in the near future.

Well, that ends my euphoric rant about my fall semester 2008 experience. I had to get it out and I thought that this was the best way to do that. This was definitely the late Christmas gift that arrived for me out of nowhere...and I definitely earned it this time around. I am happy and I am blessed this holiday year.







Getting ready for the spring semester and its opportunities for growth,
Hasani Wheat
Class of '10