Introducing: Ranup Katwal.  

Ranup is a student at Georgia State Perimeter College whose family moved to the United States about ten years ago. Since the beginning of his academic journey, Ranup’s passion has been a career in Computer Science.  

While talking about our academic selves, I discovered that we have a few things in common that connect us. First, we are both in the same English class, which is a given similarity. Second, Ranup is a first-generation college student; and so am I. In the past, Ranup struggled with regularly making good grades, and frequently found it easier to meet the mark at the average point and stop there. After taking a step back and reflecting on his performance in high school, Ranup found that continuing his education would lead him to a field he would find passion in, unlike school had given him in the past.  

Education is a journey that leads to larger opportunities, like Ranup discovering that developing open-world games, rather than only playing them, would be the right career path he would enjoy partaking in. From what I learned while meeting with Ranup, open-world games offer endless opportunities for its players to enjoy. From an introspective standpoint, our experiences and academic selves push us onward to larger goals, similarly to the hypothetical characters in the games Ranup wishes to develop in the future.  

            I would like to introduce you to Abdulaziz Usman. He is a 15-year-old first year student here at Georgia state university. He spent most of his life here in Georgia. Abdulaziz attended many different k-12 schools, simply because the schools in his area wasn’t good, that it lacked good education. He chose Georgia state because it is close to him. He started college right after high school because he didn’t want to waste any time and to finish school early so he can have a jump start in his career. Abdulaziz is going to get his degree in computer science then later get his bachelors.       

         Three words that describes Abdlaziz academic self is Determined, curious and worrisome. He is determined to do his best in all his class and make all A’s and B’s. Although he wants to learn new things, he is worried because he is not so sure if he is doing the assignments right, or if he understands the materials that is given to him. Abdlaziz quickly realized that college isn’t the same as high school, where in high school he didn’t have to try harder, and the learning came easier to him. He wasn’t fully preparing for how different college was and the amount of adapting he had to do. Later he knew that if he wanted to do right in college, he needs to put in more time to study. Make more effort into doing his work and be engaged in class time.

         Abdlaziz said after learning about the 5-step study cycle he saw an improvement in his work, and he felt more confident. He stated working harder and continued to do his best. He realized if he wants to do his best, he got to put fourth all the hard work to not only make himself proud but his family. Abdlaziz determination made him a better student now. He is always looking for more opportunity to improve his academic self. He Is now looking at his academic self and he proud of it, this made him more motivated. The way he stared the semester off nothing was going right for him, all the work he did he felt as if it was worthless and wanted to give up, but he remember is family and all the hard work they did to make him have a better life and education. This made him not to give up but only to work harder.

      Although abdlaziz and I came from different background we are much similar. We both went through tuff times in school, where we wanted to give up, frustrated on how much college was hard. We didn’t let this small set back fail us, it motivated us to do better make ourselves and families proud. This is a lesson learned and we will continue to better in school.

Work cited

Usman, Abdlaziz. Interview. By Isatu Diallo 3 February 2022

                                          Academic Profile of Brandon Powell

  I’ve had the time to meet with Brandon Powell to talk about his academic profile. Our interviews included us discussing his goals, not only academically, but his goals in life as well. Brandon is 20 years old, and it is his second semester hear at Georgia Perimeter. He was born in St. Thomas and spent Kindergarten through 4^th grade in the Virgin Islands. In the middle of 4^th grade, he moved to Virginia for about two years. In 6^th grade, he moved to Georgia where he attended and graduated from Shiloh Highschool. Brandon’s major is Computer Science and hopes to have a career with programing video games. He enjoys creating content videos for YouTube with his friends.

     One thing Brandon is passionate about is school. He’s always been a great student and what keeps him going is the influence he gets from his mom. Growing up, his mom taught him that’s its important to put school first. Being academically successful is always a key aspect to have. Going to school and getting and education is important to him. His favorite subject in school is English. Brandon is a great writer and has a love for books. He loves to read and write about Greek Mythology and his favorite book series to read is the Percy Jackson’s books.

   Brandon’s music teacher also influences him. His music teachers taught him creativity and showed him another love for music. Being able to also teach a group of people music is another strong aspect Brandon has. Brandon had a passion for music and used to be a part of the choir program in school. While he was a part of choir, he used to teach the boys how to sing in the Tenor key. I asked Brandon why he decided to major in Computer Science rather than music and he said that he “lost his passion”. When his old high school got a new choir teacher, it just wasn’t the same to him.

   Three words to describe Brandon’s academic self is persistent, hardworking, and “very lazy”, or as I like to call it, a procrastinator. When he told me that he built his own computer, I was very shocked. Not a lot of people can say that they can create their own computer, so for Brandon to have a creative skill like that is amazing. Being a procrastinator might not be a good trait to have, but it never stopped Brandon. He has the skills to be academically successful in the technology field, and if he ever gets his passion back, he can also be successful in the music industry. I know whichever route Brandon goes with, he’ll be the best at it.

This is my take on the interview I had with my partner, Fatoumata Diallo on her upbringing to how she got to where is currently. We scheduled interview questions via text message due to both of our busy schedules and proceeded from there. Fatoumata is a 17 year old college attendee attending Georgia State University’s Clarkston Campus. I say attendee because Fatoumata is in the DECA program which allows her to take college courses as a high school student. She is the first in her family to go to college and she plans on graduating in the class of 2024 with her bachelor’s degree in Biology. She received her k-12 education in the state of Georgia at a variety of schools, which influenced her decision to stay within the state to pursue a higher level of education. 

I made it my responsibility to understand my partner and how she describes herself, academically. She described herself as a hardworking, visual, and flexible person. We share a common factor which is that we both attended the DECA program. This program is for scholars that are very hardworking to earn a chance to graduate high school with both a college associate’s degree and high school diploma which she is taking advantage of. She then mentioned that her best way of learning new material or reviewing past material is to see the material multiple times and make sure to quiz herself. I felt as though this was an amazing habit that she picked up and felt the need to take note of that for myself. Lastly, she mentioned that she is very flexible in the way that she learns so she is very open to new learning mechanisms and feel as though there is no one way to learn anything. 

Fatoumata presented to me that her main goal is to strive to be the best her she can be. She believes academic success is important, and goes on to show this through her work. With her being a first generation student and graduate, she must focus on the most important things for herself right now which is going to the next level. Due to Fatoumata taking advantage of the program that she is in, she is even closer to getting her bachelor’s degree and she plans on finding a job within that field immediately after graduating. During our discussions, she would mention the importance of this milestone for not only herself, but also for her family as well. 

Hardworking is one of many words I’ll use to describe Mensur Muzyin. In his first year in college, Mensur is intended to major in Computer and Electrical Engineering. He is from Ethiopia and has just moved to America to start college. With this change, Mensur had to adjust to the learning standards of America rather than Ethiopia. Overcoming the struggles of taking on 17 credits and working 20 hours Mensur doesn’t waste his time. So far he has done well and plans to build a strong foundation for his future career.

Some people could never guess what it’s like moving from one country to another, especially to go to school. There could be tons of barriers holding one back from fully grasping another culture. In Mensur’s case, it would be how the material is taught in the two countries. One example would be in math, in American schools PEMDAS is taught, which means parenthesis, exponents, multiplication, division, addition, and subtraction. However, in Ethiopia BODMAS is taught, which means brackets, order, division, multiplication, addition, and subtraction. It’s a small difference compared to many others, but if one from a different country was asked to solve the American PEMDAS they wouldn’t be able to unless they did the research.

A small link could be found between Mensur’s situation and the reading “COVID-ERA College: Are Students Satisfied?” This article is about how college students feel about coming back to school during the time of covid, like are they ready to come back? Will it be easy for them? How can we help? In a case like Mensur’s, it would be easy to make sure a transition like country swapping is as smooth as possible. With the right protocols because of covid, it would be easy to set up a better system or program to welcome international students, rather than make them go through a stressful process just to get admitted, then more processes to get settled with classes.

Mensur is dedicated and focused on setting himself up for success in the future. Taking on 17 credits in school and 20 hours of work and still doing good in school with no complaints. As a student, he has a promising future ahead of him and with no doubt, he will d anything to keep up the great work.

References:

Ezarik, M. (2021, March 24). Student experiences during COVID and campus reopening concerns. Retrieved February 9, 2022, from https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2021/03/24/student-experiences-during-covid-and-campus-reopening-concerns?utm_source=pocket_mylist

This essay is based off my partner Jaslyn Hamilton and what is considered to be her academic self. Throughout a few days of interviewing her and holding several conversations I’ve gathered a good amount of information from Jaslyn. Jaslyn Hamilton is a 16-year-old student and has attended Georgia State University through dual enrollment for the last six months.Jaslyn plans on graduating from Dekalb Early College Academy which is the school she attends along with going to GSU. Jaslyn is majoring in criminal justice and is currently taking intro to criminal justice as one of her classes. Jaslyn wants to have a successful career as a lawyer or a private eye, being that her mother is her biggest inspiration for proceeding down this career path.  

Jaslyn’s mother has made her into the young lady that she is today and has a major influence on to who she is. She states that her mother is the influences her morals, traits that she displays, and many other attributes to who she is as a person. Jaslyn’s mother encourages her to be the best version of herself and shows her how to improve on her bad qualities. Her mother is the hardest working person that she knows so she wants to be able to return the same energy. The three words that Jaslyn uses to describe her academic self are proactive, adaptive, and hardworking. By being proactive Jaslyn says that she gets all her work done in a timely manner so that she can turn assignments in on time. She finds that being adaptive to different learning styles/ teaching styles has gotten her a long way during her time at GSU. Jaslyn stated, “I can adapt pretty easily to new teaching styles, new classes and schedules in order to succeed”. Jaslyn has always been known as hardworking and goes beyond no matter how much assignments she’s been assigned. As either a lawyer or private eye, she will have to go above and beyond in order to procure the best results in that field.

During her time in college, Jaslyn shared a frustration that she has been having. Her frustration occurs when different teachers weigh different assignments at different percentages. She explains that in high school there are a set of percentages things are weighed for in each class. “Usually, homework and classwork were weighed more than test, but in college what assignments they want to weigh more than others. The professors can really weigh any assignment with any percentages that they want”.

To conclude my interview with Jaslyn, what I’ve gathered from my time in speaking with her is that she is very set on her goals and will stop at nothing to accomplish them. During this interview I’ve learned things that I haven’t learned before such as what a private eye is. Speaking with Jaslyn has helped me understand that everyone has their own path that they must walk in life, and no one’s will be the same. She has a great academic self and I see her succeeding in her path to become a lawyer or private eye. Throughout the few things that we have watching during this semester so far, her favorite reading was “Redesigning College Education: Dismantling Trauma During Covid”. While reviewing this reading, Jaslyn states that she can relate to it in terms of mental stability. In that article she understands how stressful the situations may have been for them. She realizes that everyone is going through their own battles and troubles in their own way and can sympathize with them.