Category Archives: 322

Academic Profile: Meklit Abera

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“Just get up!” is what Meklit would say to herself if she ever encountered failing. She is a determined Georgia State University sophomore who I had the pleasure of interviewing on January 23rd, 2022. She knows what hard work looks like and won’t stop until she gets what she wants. So, when she had to wait a year to start college, she didn’t hesitate to find a way to learn in that gap year.

               Meklit is a first-generation college student who immigrated here from Ethiopia after graduating from high school, Fountain of Knowledge, in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. If you think navigating high school was hard here in the United States, try learning at a school with less resources and made to take all the harder classes at once. That sounds difficult to me but Meklit’s ambition and the admiration she has for her entrepreneur parents gave her the strength and motivation to pull through the chaos of high school. Even though Meklit knew she wanted to go to college after high school she had to wait one year because of COVID. Instead of relaxing she enrolled in Parsons School of Design in New York City and earned a Fashion Illustration Certificate in 2020.

               She has always been excited about fashion ever since she was a kid playing with Babies. That creativity is what propelled her to go to New York before choosing to come to Georgia State University. Now she is channeling her artistry into a new direction by majoring in Computer Science. While being a creative and a woman in a field of science can be difficult, Meklit is using her ambition to pursue her vision of building web sites and apps that focus on fashion. Choosing what school to building her vision wasn’t one that was taken lightly.

Georgia State University wasn’t Meklit’s only option to go to college, she also got into a school in Canada. Picking a college and country to live in is a big decision at any age but Meklit chose to be in an area where she had the most family.  For Meklit, family is a big motivator and support system that will help her succeed in college. Even her oldest sister, Nadi, is in her senior year as an electrical engineering student and one of the biggest people in her life that helps fuel her drive. When Meklit is feeling defeated and out of energy she turns to Tekla, her best friend and hype woman. They are both in college so sharing the struggle of figuring out tuition and why they must take classes that don’t pertain to their major is a bonding experience for them.

               While Meklit doesn’t know where she would be without her support network, the video “Beliefs that make you Fail…or Succeed” shown in her Composition II class, stuck with her. “For every distraction you have, you reduce the amount you learn, increase the time it takes to understand the material and increase the chance for a bad grade,” says Dr. Stephen Chew.  For someone that has a lot of drive to succeed, often exhaustion kicks in, and she feels like taking a break. Learning about what she shouldn’t do will allow her to use her limited time more wisely.

               Being a college student is stressful. Being in a new state and country can be disorienting. Having to juggle a job, studying, and trying to find personal time can be overwhelming, but with Meklit’s ambition and creativity, she will find ways to overcome her exhaustion.

Young woman looking into camera with determination.

Take by Meklit on her 19th birthday.

 

Work Cited

  • Meklit Abera, Pair interview transcript, January 2022
  • Steven C, PhD; Beliefs that makes you fail or succeed, Samford University, AL
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Academic Profile of Debora Mekonnen

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Debora Mekonnen

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

                  Hello, this an interview with Debora Mekonnen about her academic self. She’s 19 years old she’s currently enrolled at Georgia State Perimeter College and doesn’t quite know what she wants to major in yet. We talked on the phone and discussed our experiences, how are we as college students now, and what’s the hardest thing to get through in college. She graduated from Brookwood high school. Although she’s still indecisive of her major her favorite subject is English. During her spare time, she likes to read books, listen to different music genres, and hang out with friends. The most frustrating thing for her since she started college was finding the best and different ways to study for certain classes.

Debora is an amazing student three words to describe her academic self are motivated, driven, punctual. She is motivated because she wants to be successful in the life and graduate in whatever field she decides to accomplish. Debora is driven because she’s an overachiever on any assignment she completes and does her best. She’s punctual because she focuses on planning in advance and tracks how long tasks will take her. Her goal is to work in something medical field related she likes to help children but doesn’t like to work with blood.

Debora is eager to learn new things and is ready for any challenging thing that comes her way. During the discussion she mentioned how she is very serious about her tasks in school. She wants your GPA to raise higher each semester, and she makes sure she completes all assignments on time with the professor’s expectations. All three words to describe Debora’s self-academic connected to study strategies that Dr. Chew mentioned. Dr. Chew said, “In order to succeed, you need to reduce or, even better, eliminate all these distractions.” Debora’s relates to this because she limits her cell phone and other things that distract her during study time for a better understanding.

In conclusion, even though Debora has not figured out her actual career path, yet she will achieve all the goals she has set for herself during this semester. She is a hardworking student that stays on task to finish her classes with a passing grade. Although, college can be hard trying to adjust from high school the experience and new opportunities can be for the better. Debora will continue to attend Georgia State University and pursue her goals.

 

Citations:

Academic Profile of Farrah Rudder

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When I asked Farrah Rudder what she likes most about being a college student, she replied, “I live the same thing every day except when I’m in school. I get to be somebody different.” Her academic career is one of self-discovery and determination. In fact, “perseverance” is the word Farrah uses to describe her academic self, and after hearing her story, it’s easy to see why.   

A first-generation college student and the middle child of five siblings, Farrah was born in Chicago, Illinois and moved to Georgia at the age of seven. Because her family moved around so much when she was young, Farrah was forced to change schools frequently, making it impossible for her to find any consistency in her schoolwork or friendships. However, in the summer before 9th grade, Farrah and her family moved back to Chicago, and it was there that she began to blossom as a student. Farrah made school her number one priority, became the top ranked student in her class, and eventually earned a much-coveted Posse Scholarship (a full- tuition scholarship to attend college), beating out hundreds of student applicants from all over the state of Illinois. Unfortunately, her mom decided that the family would move back to Georgia for her senior year, forcing Farrah to change schools (again) and forfeit her scholarship. Disappointed and resentful, Farrah found it difficult to muster the same effort and ardor that she previously had towards school, and after graduation, she did what everyone else in her family had done before her: forwent college and got a job. 

After three years of working non-stop, Farrah felt “stuck” and saw herself going in a direction that was all too familiar. Farrah explained, “I learned from family members what not to do. They were doing nothing with their lives.” Wanting something more for herself, Farrah made the leap of quitting her job, and began, as she puts it, taking the “value out of money.” She applied for and received financial aid, and by the fall of 2019, was enrolled as a full-time student at Georgia State University. After completing her first full semester, Farrah’s self-confidence and enthusiasm were through the roof. Then, out of nowhere, Covid hit. Suddenly, the thing she had worked so hard to attain was in danger of being ripped away. Farrah recalled, “I was devastated. It felt like I’d had the rug pulled out from under me.” Forced to take classes online, Farrah found it difficult to keep up and

Farrah Rudder

Farrah Rudder-Photographer and Date unknown

remain engaged, but to her credit, she endured. Not surprisingly, the class reading that most resonates with Farrah is, “Redesigning College Education: Dismantling Trauma During Covid” by Roshelle Czar. In her article, Czar states, “trauma is centered on an individual experience and can manifest in various ways” ( Czar 2021). For Farrah, the threat of losing her new-found purpose and improved self-worth was indeed traumatic.    

In speaking with Farrah about her college experience, one thing is clear: though getting to this point has not been easy, staying has often been just as hard. At times, the work can be overwhelming, and without much support from family members who have different lifestyles and no college experience, Farrah often feels alone and unappreciated. “They don’t respect how much work goes into being a full-time student,” Farrah said, and for this reason, she hopes to one day live on GSU’s downtown campus to surround herself with the support of other like-minded students. And remarkably, even without much outside support, Farrah is not merely surviving college; she is thriving. As a business major, Farrah earned a 3.5 GPA last semester, and is scheduled to graduate in the spring. She also expresses an interest in one day studying law, and due to her environmental science class (her favorite this semester), she has developed a desire to someday become an environmentalist.  

To hear Farrah talk about her college experience is inspiring; her enthusiasm is infectious. It is obvious that attending college is much more to her than just a means to an end. She likes being out of the house, she likes being around people every day, and more than anything else, she likes the person she is becoming. And though Farrah admits that she is far from a perfect student (“procrastination” was her other academic self word), she’s aware of how far she has come, and I get the sense that she is just getting started. When I asked Farrah what she is most proud of with her academic self, she humbly replied, “I’m just proud to be here.” She should be. 

 

Citations:

  • Rudder, Farrah,  Academic Self Interview. By Keith Slettedahl Jan 26, 2022.
  • Czar, Roshelle, Redesigning College Education: Dismantling College during Covid, 2021 https://hope4college.medium.com/redesigning-college-education-dismantling-trauma-during-covid-97ad3319edbd