Dominique Lawson Academic Profile

                                           Ms. Dominique Lawson- Georgia State University

 

      This profile is a compilation of interviews held with Dominique Lawson that were conducted over email. During the email interviews, we discussed our academic selves, high school experiences, and our plans for the future. Dominique dropped out of high school but later received her GED at the age of 30. When she had decided to leave school, her grandmother had just passed away, and she had to move in with her best friends. It understandably became hard for her to make school a priority. In 2017, she decided that she wanted to change her life, so she enrolled at Miami Dade Community College and studied for her GED. Dominique struggled with the math portion of the test, but with a lot of studying, she passed. The frustrating thing about college for her is that she has to take three or more classes to receive financial aid. She has been a student at GSU since 2018, but she has only completed one spring semester. Dominique believes that anyone who is trying to make something out of their life with nothing is an influence to her.

 

      The three words that described her academic self were structured, strategic, and thorough. She prefers to get assignments done on time and to perfect them the first time she does them. She spends a few hours both before and after work double-checking her assignments to make sure there are no flaws. She plans out each day to ensure she has time for school and will often wake up at five a.m. to complete assignments in advance. She refuses to risk falling behind on her school work. She does not have any continuous study habits, but she is a good note-taker. Dominique’s academic self is motivated to break a generation curse, and the idea of becoming too overwhelmed and walking away from school is Dominiques biggest academic fear.

 

      Dominique’s fear of becoming too overwhelmed with school motivates her to spend as much of her free time as she can perfecting her assignments. However, her biggest academic challenge is finding balance between school and work. Both are very important to her, and to achieve her academic goal, she has to stick to a daily schedule. Dominique has faced a few personal challenges as well on her journey of obtaining her college degree. Not only did she lose her grandmother in high school, but she faced the loss of her mother in 2019. Before this loss, she was a full-time student but to maintain balance in her life, she understandably sits out summer sessions.

 

      Dominique is currently majoring in health science, where she plans to become a Nurse Practitioner. Unlike being a regular nurse, becoming a nurse practitioner will give her open space to treat her patients in a broader manner. The loss of her grandmother was Dominique’s inspiration to pursue nursing. She was always good at taking care of others therefore, this career just felt right for her. She plans to complete her nursing degree while employed at Emory as a nursing tech and at Morehouse school of medicine as a research coordinator. Dominique has two academic goals. The first, is to raise her GPA to the highest it can be. The second, is to finish her BSA.

2 thoughts on “Dominique Lawson Academic Profile

  1. This was very well put together. I like how you were able to include the challenges Dominique faces outside of the classroom and how they impact her as a student. It shows that it is never as simple as someone’s abilities in the classroom; there are always other circumstances that impact our abilities in school.

  2. It’s amazing how she has a lot of discipline to not fall behind in school. I really admire her because she had many things that could have affected her academic self, but she did not let them get to her, and I liked how it motivated her to achieve something in life.