My Final Blog for College Comp II :-(

Hello, everyone. Unfortunately, this will be the last blog I write for this course. I have learned so much over these past 10 weeks and I enjoyed every minute of seminar with very supportive and caring classmates and, of course, our wonderful professor, Julie. I was very nervous when I started this course 10 weeks ago because I have never considered myself a good writer but I now know what makes a good writer isn't so much the talent you have for writing but more about the things you want or need to say and getting those ideas down on paper. I received so much help with APA formatting which was giving me some anxiety in my previous class. With the help of our very knowledgeable instructor, I understand APA alot better now. THANK YOU, JULIE!!!! I know that I will remember all the great ideas I learned in this class and will definitely use the tools I have learned to write excellent research papers in the future. We should all be proud of ourselves. We took a difficult course and we came through it with flying colors. Great job, everybody!! Good luck to all of you, I will miss you and hope to see some faces in my next courses!!! Have a great week!!!!

SAD THAT CLASS IS COMING TO AN END

Hello, everyone. I am very sad that this will be the second to the last blog that I will be writing in this class. I just want to let everyone know how much I have enjoyed working with you all and a special thank you to our wonderful professor who made the course so enjoyable. Thank you, Julie!!! I hope you will all keep in touch with me and maybe I will see some of you in my future courses. I feel really good about what I have learned in this class. I have really learned some valuable information that I know will serve me well in not only my academic life but also in my personal life. I am so glad I decided to come out of my comfort zone and write a paper on a very painful and personal subject such as suicide. I am so proud of my paper and I really hope everyone enjoys reading it. I will be looking forward to your comments on it. Even if they are not so good, let me hear it, I can handle it. LOL Good luck to all of us in our future at Kaplan!

I LOVE TO BLOG!!!!

Good morning, Julie and fellow classmates. My blog this week is going to answer Julie's question- Will I continue my blog after this course is over? My answer is a resounding YES!!! I love writing about things that are going on in my life-both academically and personally. I find getting my feelings and thoughts out is very helpful in dealing with the stresses and pressures of everyday life. Also, it helps to know that you are not alone and I really find comfort in the comments that people share with me. It is nice to know that we are all in this together and I do believe that is why I have been so successful in school up until now. I have so much in common with all of my classmates and I strongly feel that I have not only met people that I can share my education with but I am also forming friendships that will last a lifetime. That makes this journey worth it all....not to mention the Associates Degree I will have which will be the pay-off for all this hard work!!!! Hope everyone has a great week and keep up the great work. WE CAN DO IT!!!!!

Peer Reviews

Good evening, everybody. I am writing my blog about peer reviews and how beneficial they have been for me. I have to admit I don't like negative feedback when it comes to my writing but I have learned through my College Composition I class and the Academic Strategies for the Healthcare Professional class that I had in term 1 that the negative comments help you to correct mistakes that you may have not been aware of. I have also learned that constructive criticism is not a personal attack but rather a way of helping me through the rough spots of writing a paper and catch errors that, I myself, may not have seen. It is a fresh perspective and is not meant to be mean or hurtful. I am a self-proclaimed people pleaser so if people don't like what I have written I used to get upset but now I just take what they are telling me in a positive light and do my best to listen to their comments and fix what needs to be fixed. My experience with peer review in the past has been a positive one and I am open to any suggestions anyone may have to make my paper better. After all, we are all here to learn and we are on this journey together! Good luck to everyone! :-)

September is a tough month

Hello, Julie and fellow classmates. This time of year always brings me a little down. I was married on September 1, 1990 so today would have been my 20th wedding anniversary. As if remembering that date isn't bad enough, I know that in 3 more months I will be remembering my husband's birthday, December 1st and the date of his death, December 8th. On a much happier note, my son, Kyle will turn 16 on September 22nd, so that is one bright spot in this terrible time of year. Also, football season is about to start and I am a HUGE New York Giants fan and have been since I was a 14 yrs old. I was very apprehensive about writing my paper on suicide because it brings up alot of painful memories but, as someone once told me, you can't go around your grief; you have to go through it. I am really looking forward to doing the research for this paper an I am hoping it will give me advice on how to deal with my children and let them know that I will always be here for them no matter what they are going through. Hope everyone has a Great Labor Day Weekend! Stay Safe!

Academic challenges

Hello, Julie and fellow classmates. I am going to post this week on the academic challenges I have faced since going back to school. Before I started school I didn't think I could do this. I am 39 years old and a mother of 4 children...what could I possibly contribute to a school environment? When I started my classes last February I could not believe how many mothers were in the class and I realized that I was in good company because there were alot of people who didn't think they have what it takes to pursue a college degree. That was 6 months ago and, not only do I realize that I do have what it takes to succeed at Kaplan, I am very proud of what I have accomplished. I couldn't do it without the ongoing support of my friends and family. I couldn't do this without them. Some days it is very challenging to get everything done I have to do but I always put school as a #1 priority. I set aside 2 hrs (and more if I need it) every day just for school and my kids know when I am in the kitchen at night, I am doing schoolwork and I am not to be bothered. The advice I would give to anyone who was not sure if they could make going back to school work is this: you do what you have to do and if you want the degree badly enough you will do WHATEVER it takes to get it. And to my fellow classmates- we are halfway through this class and I think we should give ourselves a pat on the back! Good luck to us all!!!

My Feelings on Plagiarism

Hello, everyone. Tonight I am going to share my feelings on plagiarism. Unfortunately, I have had experience with plagiarism from high school, when classmates would copy my work and pass it off as their own, to co-workers who took credit for my ideas. I believe that everyone deserves the recognition for their ideas and it is very wrong for people to take those ideas and pass them off as their own. One instance of plagiarism comes to mind when I recall how my supervisor at my previous job asked me for my input on a project and then proceeded to pass of my suggestions to her superior as her own. She received the credit for an idea that I came up with and I never felt the same way about her after that. I did take her supervisor aside and explain that the concept that she thought this person came up with was actually my idea and I eventually did get the credit for it but I never looked at that person the same way again. I hope she learned her lesson not to take advantage of her subordinates but I heard through the grapevine that she is no longer employed there....I wonder why!