Education Abroad Program and my job

       While I was unable to make the visit to the Education Abroad Center, I am still able to discuss this amazing program through my work perspective. I work at the UCSB Annual Fundraiser as a caller. The Annual Fund is a nonprofit organization here on campus that supports free student programs such as CLAS, EAP, Women's Center, Counseling and Career Services, and more! My role is to call alumni and parents and ask for donations. Not the most appealing sounding job to most, but I actually truly enjoy and value the conversations I have with people!
       Right now I am calling a donor pool called "YFD EAP", which are recent graduates that traveled abroad. Often times I will strike up conversation with them about their experiences traveling out of the country. I talked to one recent graduate who spent a year in France after studying French, and I took french in high school. She gave me great suggestions about where to go and what to do if I decide to travel to France. Another person I talked to originally intended to spend only a semester in Spain, but thankfully chose a program that allowed her to extend her stay for a year. I never knew this was an option, and after talking to a student supervisor who travels plenty, I found out about a flexible program that actually fit my criteria for traveling abroad! I am thankful I chose an on campus job that supports student programs because I am learning so much about my university.

This is sometimes how I feet at work. Mostly I don't look like this though!

Dr. Don Lubach and Library Visit

Don Lubach's presentation was not my favorite of all the speaker's presentations we have had, but nonetheless it was interesting. I guess you don't really think about who is responsible for all the fun freshman activities we've been having and that we will have this upcoming year, so when he said that  was his job I was a bit surprised. I appreciate the thought and effort that goes into making my first year of college the best it can be. I also thought it was quirky and interesting when he discussed Reddit, the "social networking site for nerds". I also appreciated the refresher of the steps of critical thinking: understanding the data, distinguishing opinions from facts, analyzing sources for validity and accuracy, and exploring alternative explanations. I will try and apply these steps in my future classes, for example Sociology.

Unfortunately most of the material covered during our library visit was review for me because I'm taking the intro to library research freshman seminar. The note about finding last minute resources for papers was helpful (thanks for the question, Zack!). I am glad I took the course and that you scheduled the visit because I think it's super important to know your way around the library, especially if you are going into research at UCSB.

I included a picture of cereal today, because I'm starting to eat it more and more as I like DLG food less and less...