March 7, 2025 • 46 mins
The first week of freshman year can be overwhelming - but what about week two? Or three? Or eight? By the time you've reached mid-semester, it can feel like a sink or swim situation.
That's why Dr. Ross and producer Michaela Murphy are checking back in with their freshman guests from episode one. In the thick of their first semester, Dominic Robinette and Mary Mooney share firsthand experiences with freshman year. Whether it's switching majors, adapting to an independent lifestyle, or struggling with comparison, their stories offer concrete advice and encouragement for students approaching this challenging life transition.
To hear part one of Mary and Dominic's discussion, check out their previous episode: S2 Ep. 1: What Can I Expect From Freshman Year?
Have more questions about the freshman experience? Email us at ADRquestions@gmail.com. We'd love to hear from you!
Special thanks to Michaela Murphy, who produced and co-hosted season two's opening episodes. The show goes on because of you!
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:04):
Stay tuned to the Ask Dr Ross podcast.
It's created to give you infoto succeed at college.
Our hosts are highly qualified.
Dr Catherine Ross is a memberof the University of Texas
System's Academy ofDistinguished Teachers.
She's also a popular professorof 19th century English
literature.
Ask Dr Ross is a communityservice of the University of
(00:27):
Texas at Tyler.
Speaker 2 (00:30):
Well, I'm happy to see you both here this afternoon
again.
This is our second episode withour first-year students.
We don't call you freshmenanymore, you have to be a
first-year person, and what wewanted to do is, after a few
more weeks of class, we wantedto interview you again and hear
what you have learned in thetime since we first met you.
So I'll ask you each tointroduce yourself and remind us
(00:54):
what your name is, where yourhometown is and what your major
is, if you know.
So we'll start with Dominic.
Speaker 3 (01:03):
My name's Dominic.
I'm from Midland originally andactually I've switched majors
since the last time we had thismeeting, so before I was pre-med
.
But I made a pretty big shiftto electrical engineering.
Speaker 2 (01:19):
Wow, well, we'll be talking about that shortly.
Great Dominic Mary.
Speaker 4 (01:24):
So my name's Mary, my hometown is Jacksonville, texas
, and I've kept my major I'mstill majoring in English.
Speaker 2 (01:31):
Well, of course, it's the best major on the campus,
right?
So you're from a really faraway, dominic.
How's that been being that farfrom home after what?
Eight weeks now?
Speaker 3 (01:41):
It hasn't been bad.
I've gone home for one weekendso far, but I've actually
adjusted quite well.
I would say, you know, I'vegotten into a pretty good
schedule, Like I keep in touchwith my family, Like I still
call them all the time, and youknow, I've just I've adapted to
it, I'm used to it now.
Speaker 2 (01:59):
Do you have pretty busy weekends here?
Speaker 3 (02:01):
My weekends aren't normally too busy, but I mean, I
do spend them trying to getahead in classes usually, and
I'm not just saying that either,but that's mostly what I do on
the weekends.
Speaker 2 (02:13):
Dominic's teacher is here, so he's.
Are you being careful aboutwhat you say in front of your
teacher?
Speaker 3 (02:18):
No, if anything, she probably knows what my work
ethic is like.
Speaker 2 (02:23):
You're welcome to comment on that, Michaela.
Speaker 5 (02:26):
He is a great student .
I'm sure he's doing exactlywhat he needs to do.
Speaker 2 (02:30):
Mary is also here and she's, of course, my student,
so she's being careful what shesays to me.
But you know you can saywhatever you want, so talk about
how things are changing becauseyou're from Jacksonville so
you're real close to home.
Do you go home every weekend?
Speaker 4 (02:43):
For the most part.
It's not every weekend I goback home, but it's like maybe
every other weekend.
My best friend from my hometown, she went to Sam Houston.
So sometimes when she comes upI usually go home and I do a
visit like that.
But I try to stay on campus asmuch as I can because I feel I
want that autonomy to live bymyself and my mom's like, oh,
(03:03):
come home, but it's like I movedaway for a reason, so let me
stay on campus.
But yeah, maybe every otherweekend I go back home.
Speaker 2 (03:12):
How about you?
Speaker 3 (03:13):
Did you move away for autonomy For a little bit?
I was excited to get out and beable to kind of just live life,
see what it was like.
I didn't expect to go as far asI did, but you know I enjoy it
here.
It's nice.
Speaker 2 (03:25):
Well now, folks who haven't heard our previous
interview don't know why youcame so far away.
You want to tell this audiencewhy you came all the way from
West Texas to Far East Texas.
That's like going across twostates in some places.
Speaker 3 (03:42):
Midland.
It's an okay place.
You know it's not the bestlooking.
Really that was a big thing.
But also I was ready for achange.
Like I've lived in West Texasmy whole life, only saw like one
type of area, only lived inMidland Really flat, hot, mm-hmm
.
And so I was ready to come to adifferent place and Tyler was
great because it's green here,you know, there's like rolling
hills everywhere, lots of trees,and I'm just like you know.
(04:05):
I was very happy.
Speaker 2 (04:07):
You know, a lot of people don't realize how much of
a difference a campus can make.
You know the place and, ofcourse, you both live here on
campus, right, and where youlive, and which apartments or
dorm.
I live in Ornelas Hall, thefirst-year student's dorm.
What about you, mary?
Same First year student's dorm.
What about you, mary?
Same?
Yeah, I am too.
Yeah, how is the dorm lifetreating you Mary?
Speaker 4 (04:26):
I love my dorm.
Actually I have one of thethree bedroom suites so I have
like my own room.
So it's not technically a dormexperience like every other
college, but it's somewhat.
One of my roommates is the RA.
Ra is the residential assistantand pretty much it's like the
(04:46):
dorm police, but she's superchill.
But she does like health andsafety checks, which is like
going into the other people onmy floors, dorms, and checks
that make sure like they're notbreaking any rules.
So having her as a roommatekind of is like a different
experience, I guess, becauseshe's a junior, not a freshman,
so it's a different perspectiveon college.
But yeah, I love my dorm, likeabsolutely love it.
Speaker 2 (05:07):
Just a little side note here.
The health and safety checksare to make sure things like you
don't have 16 things pluggedinto one outlet and are about to
start the place on fire oryou're keeping things clean,
things like that.
So it may feel like a littlebit of an intrusion, but it's
actually for your safety, isn'tit?
And does she do it fairlydiscreetly?
Speaker 4 (05:25):
Well, she doesn't do the health and safety checks on
our dorm because it's like shecould just like let stuff slide.
So we actually have the wholeRA director for the whole entire
building come into our dorm.
So it's like we have to makesure our stuff is tippity-top
good in shape.
But I feel like us threebecause I have two other
roommates, an RA and thenanother freshman I feel like we
(05:46):
do a pretty good job keeping ourstuff in check.
Speaker 2 (05:49):
How's your dorm going , Dominic?
Speaker 3 (05:51):
It hasn't been bad at all.
You know I also am in athree-person suite.
I'm not with the RA, you know,I'm with two other first-year
students and we actually hangout quite a bit.
Like earlier this week we wentto Walmart with another friend,
you know, and we were just kindof messing around because my
friend, he wanted to go shoppingfor his frat because he needed
to, and so we went and did thatwith him.
(06:13):
And you know we go out to eatsometimes and we just kind of
hang out.
Speaker 2 (06:16):
Now are freshmen allowed to have cars here.
Speaker 3 (06:18):
Yes.
Speaker 2 (06:19):
Because a lot of times the first year students
will not be allowed to haveautomobiles for various reasons.
But if y'all have cars, you'repretty mobile.
Then you are pretty autonomous,aren't you?
So what we asked you early onwas did you think you were well
prepared from high school forcollege?
And do you remember what yousaid last time, dominic?
And then we'll go to Mary.
Speaker 3 (06:39):
I think I said that I was kind of prepared because in
high school you know,everything was super structured.
I didn't have to do anythingoutside of my classes, really
Like I hardly had any classwork,any homework like anything
outside of my classes, and thatwas really like the biggest
shock about getting here.
Speaker 2 (06:57):
Yeah, what about you, mary?
Do you remember what you said?
Speaker 4 (07:05):
I'm pretty sure I probably said I was somewhat
prepared, but now I know that Iwas definitely like,
academically prepared.
I knew that I chose the rightmajor because of my high school
classes and I feel like myeducational academics and high
school prepared me well butmentally, having like all the
autonomy and everything likethat, I definitely was not
prepared from high school.
It's a completely differentshift and I don't know, I feel
like it's such a different thingcollege and high school that it
(07:26):
really couldn't even haveprepared me mentally.
Speaker 2 (07:29):
So when you say such a big shift, what are some of
the ways that feels like?
So if you're talking to some ofthe kids back in your high
school that you know you look atit it's different.
But can you tell them what someof the details might be?
Speaker 4 (07:41):
For the biggest shifts.
Shifts it's like everything isindependent.
So while that might sound likesuch a dream in high school
because like, oh, you don't haveto listen to anyone you still
have to, like, have thatself-control to get business
things done.
Because if you don't have thatself-control then it's not going
to get done and then it's onyou, you get in trouble and it's
.
It's not a good thing.
So I feel like, while it's likesuch a pretty picture in high,
(08:04):
I would tell the kids back in myhigh school it is fun, but you
still have to have a balance.
You have to be prepared tobalance business things and fun
things.
Speaker 2 (08:13):
There's a lot more work in there.
Yeah, I know Dominic wasnodding his head about that,
weren't you?
Speaker 3 (08:18):
Yeah, that was the biggest thing was just trying to
get myself on a schedule thatmakes sense to me and is still
structured, and so that's thebiggest thing.
I would tell anybody back at myhigh schools.
I'd be like you're going tohave free time unless you're
taking like 30 hours of classes,but you're going to have free
(08:38):
time and you need to figure outhow to use that free time in a
productive way.
You can't just be like oh, Iwent to classes, I'm just going
to go sit in my room.
Speaker 2 (08:47):
You know, one of the things we tell students is for
every hour you spend in class,you should spend three hours
outside of class.
Now when we do research onwhether or not students really
do that, usually the ones whoget closest to that are the ones
that are making A's and maybeB's, the ones who just kind of
do a little bit.
You know about an hour for anhour.
(09:08):
A lot of times they're notdoing as well as you think.
This is a whole different levelof information gathering of
information, retrieval ofapplication of that material.
Have you found that you'regetting close to that amount of
work for every hour or have youeven thought about it like those
numbers?
Speaker 3 (09:25):
You probably haven't, but I feel like I get kind of
close to those numbers.
I don't think of it as, likeyou know, three hours
specifically.
I just think of it as if I doat least a little bit every day.
That's a lot better than justbeing like, oh, I'm going to do
it all in one day.
Speaker 2 (09:45):
And you know, and that normally doesn't work out,
yeah yeah, pedagogically, if youspread it out a little bit of
time, a little bit of timeretrieve, remind, and you know,
when you break it up, then whenyou start, come back the second
time, you have to kind of reviewwhat you did the first day and
kind of catch up and then youmove on like that.
Now you just broke someinteresting news, you have
changed your major, and I alwaystell my first year students
look out, it's going to happenand it's okay, so let's hear
(10:07):
about that.
Speaker 3 (10:09):
The biggest thing that made me want to change was
just the amount of time inschool.
You know, in order to be adoctor, it's around like eight
years and then after that youhave to spend another like four
years in residency, and there'snothing wrong with that Like I
have a lot of respect for peoplethat do that but that's not
something that I personally wantto do.
Like I want to get my education.
(10:31):
You know, possibly get amaster's I haven't thought about
that yet but just, you know,get the education and start
building up my talent.
Getting skilled at somethingand engineering is more of like
a it's going going to sound kindof mean, but like you build
your skills, more to it.
Like you don't just knoweverything, like you just kind
of you build up, like how tothink through things and how to
(10:53):
think super critically.
Speaker 2 (10:55):
There's nothing mean about that.
I mean, what you're describingis the way a discipline works.
Have you been taking anengineering class this semester
or are you just kind of guessing?
Speaker 3 (11:03):
I haven't taken an engineering class this semester,
or are you just kind ofguessing?
I haven't taken an engineeringclass this semester, so I am
just kind of guessing right now.
Speaker 2 (11:09):
Okay, well, that's interesting.
How did you discover that, allof a sudden, medicine was going
to be too many years of school?
How did you learn that?
Speaker 3 (11:16):
It was mostly cost is what I thought about.
After this semester I saw howmuch college is, even with
scholarships and get like it'sstill it's not going to be free
for me, and so I wanted to kindof get through, get the skills
that I needed and just likestart, like building myself.
Speaker 2 (11:37):
Now, this is not to suggest that you have to pay
more money and be better, butone of the things I was going to
say is that all the researchthat's been done about when
people get things for free andwhen things have to work for
things ie earn the money to getthere that actually you tend to
take it more seriously becauseyou've got more skin in the game
.
And so, while I don't want anyof you all to go into debt going
(12:00):
through college, the fact thatit does cost some money is part
of what helps to keep youmotivated to keep going.
And I often say to my studentswho are flaking off I say do you
realize how many dollars youjust wasted this week by not
doing your homework?
I strongly recommend you getyourself over to the engineering
department and start talking tosome of those students.
First, find out who the goodteachers are and this is always
(12:22):
a key thing, especially yourvery first class in a field.
Find out who the best teachersare, because a lot of times what
you think the course is goingto be like and what is going to
be covered is different, and soif you have a teacher who
renders whatever that materialis in ways that other students
have recognized as reallyvaluable and helpful, then that
(12:43):
will help you firm up thatdecision.
What about you, mary?
So you said that you're justfine with your English major.
That makes me very happy, butyou want to tell the audience
here just kind of why you findthat the English major is
working for you.
Speaker 4 (12:59):
Now, even though I'm a first-year student, I'm taking
only major specific Englishclasses.
Some are prereqs for my majorbut they're mainly just
specifically English andthroughout those classes I've
kind of like found they're notnecessarily easy, but like I'm
getting my assignments done andI think I'm getting them done
well but I'm also enjoying theactual content.
(13:20):
So I feel like that kind ofsolidified my decision on
staying in English and beingable to see all my professors
like teaching what they love andeverything.
It's just like I see myself inall my professors.
I'm like, yeah, that's what Iwant to do.
Speaker 2 (13:33):
Oh, that's great news .
That's great news.
So you're taking four Englishclasses.
Speaker 4 (13:37):
Let's see, I'm taking a literature class, a writing
class.
I have my honors world textimage class, which is, I
consider, a writing class, ispretty much what we do.
So I guess I'm only takingthree English classes and then I
have an education class.
Speaker 2 (13:52):
That's a good thing to do is to check out to see,
because a lot of times peoplethink English majors will become
teachers.
Not all of us do.
Some of us do something elseand then we come back to
teaching or we teach differentlevels.
But that's a good thing to testit out a little bit to see what
that other discipline is like.
That's why I was saying to you,dominic, be sure that you take
at least one engineering classbefore you get too far down the
line.
Now, mary, you came in with alot of prereqs done right
(14:15):
Because you'd done a lot of dualcredit right and had you done
any dual credit much.
Speaker 3 (14:20):
I didn't do any dual credit, I did only AP classes.
Speaker 2 (14:26):
So with AP classes you get credit right.
So did you start as a sophomorethen?
Speaker 3 (14:32):
No, I got very few AP credits honestly.
I mean, I still came inbasically as a freshman just a
few hours ahead of everybody.
Speaker 2 (14:41):
And actually I wanted to point this out to anybody
who's listening is that both ofyou kind of examples of two
different ways of going tocollege.
Some folks are getting a lot ofit quote out of the way, which
always bothers me as a professor, that you think that those
earlier classes are.
You're getting them out of theway because what they are is the
core curriculum.
Michaela, did you have a lot ofyour hours out of the way
before you started and became aprofessor here?
Speaker 5 (15:04):
I did when I started here.
No, sorry, when I started atTJC with my associates, by the
time I graduated high school Ialready had 44 hours out of the
way out of my 60 for myassociates, so I was almost done
.
I stayed in college about ayear after high school for my
associates.
I stayed in college about ayear after high school for my
associates.
Speaker 2 (15:24):
So you really sped up the process and in your case,
you're taking it a little bitslower in the sense.
But you're also here's the bigdifference Mary who taught your
college classes when you were inhigh school.
Speaker 4 (15:38):
My English class it was actually like a co-professor
, but all my other ones werejust high school teachers.
Speaker 2 (15:44):
High school teachers.
Okay, so you're getting yourcore classes taught by college
professors, and that can be aquantitative difference.
It may not always be.
Some of the high schoolteachers are fabulous and I
think in order to teach thoseclasses, they have to have 18
hours of graduate school in thefield.
So I'm not going to denigrateany of those folks, but the
(16:05):
difference is that you weretaking it on a high school
schedule, and the high schoolschedule is so different from a
college, as you've learned right, you have classes every other
day sometimes, or it's just anhour a day, and then two hours
later on, and there's all thisfree time in there, and so we
can give you more complexassignments.
That's why we get the threehours in.
You know you got to spend onehour with us and three hours
studying In high school.
That's not possible, and sothere's a different level there,
(16:27):
and while I think there's anadvantage in both and I'm not
going to come down on either oneI do want to point out that
Mary saved a lot of money andtime and she's gone straight
into her major.
Thank goodness, it was the oneyou wanted.
Imagine if you'd started.
Dominic went straight in andyou went oh my gosh, I don't
want to be a doctor after all.
So you're in a perfect positiontoo, so you can be studying and
(16:51):
looking around and see what youwant to study and also taking
as many of those core classes aspossible right now.
So you get a sense of well, doI like history?
Do I like philosophy?
Do I like the STEM classes?
Michaela, do you want to addanything?
Speaker 5 (17:04):
Yeah.
So that's actually one of thebiggest pieces of advice that I
always give seniors in highschool or freshmen, especially
in like my 1301 class and atthat level, is do as much as you
possibly can to see what thejob you think you want as well
as the major you think you wantis doing or is about.
(17:25):
Because, like I said in thegraduate podcast, I actually
started in nursing when I got toTJC and I decided when I was
there, after shadowing at thehospital, after doing the
workload through anatomy andphysiology classes, that it
wasn't enough.
With people, the job was great,and for other people who want
to do that sort of thing, thenthat is a't enough.
With people, the job was great,and for other people who want
(17:46):
to do that sort of thing, thenthat is a wonderful job for them
.
But for me it was not enoughinteraction with people on the
day to day.
It was a lot of computer, itwas a lot of math and I didn't
want to go that route.
I wanted to do more English,more people to people, and so I
was on the fence when I startedschool and, once again, having
44 hours, my basics were alreadyout of the way, so I didn't
(18:07):
have a lot of time to decidewhat I wanted to do out of high
school.
I just had to jump intosomething, which is great for
people who know what they wantto do, but if they don't then
it's a little bit of adisadvantage at times.
So I jumped into nursing,decided that's not what I want
to do, but thankfully TJC has aninterdisciplinary studies
(18:29):
associates that I was able toget and move to UT Tyler for my
bachelor's to start the Englisheducation program here course.
I've loved it and stuck with it.
But before I even started at UTTyler doing education I went
and applied to be a substituteteacher.
So I put myself into theclassroom before I even took
(18:51):
those classes.
That way I would know is thiswhat I want to jump into before
I got to UT Tyler.
Speaker 2 (18:57):
Also, don't you have the advantage of having a mother
and a sister who've beeneducators?
Speaker 5 (19:01):
I do yes.
So my mom was a teacher for 28years and my sister has been a
teacher for, I believe, sevenyears at this point.
So my sister teaches elementary.
So she is taught anywhere fromsecond to fifth grade PE, social
studies, english, a lot ofdifferent subjects.
And then my mom taughtpreschool and fifth grade in
(19:23):
elementaries throughout her 20years.
Speaker 2 (19:25):
So, Dominic, maybe you ought to start looking for a
chance to kind of visit someengineering situations.
We have all sorts ofopportunities for internships
that are being investigated.
But I want to tell you bothabout something Next week is our
Career Success Day, and it'ssomething we've been doing for
quite some time.
Day on Thursday, the 24th, andthere will be starting out with
(19:51):
a speaker who's going to talk toyou all about launching a
career.
Speaker 5 (19:56):
He's one of the founders, I believe, of LinkedIn
, so he knows a lot about how toget into the workforce.
Speaker 2 (20:03):
And then there are going to be all these panels.
There are going to be twosections of panels.
For example, there's one onEnglish majors who are doing
different things.
One of them is a former studentof mine who became a president
of a company largely because ofhis writing skills.
One is an editor, I believe.
I'm not sure what the other twojobs are, but it's an
interesting thing to see whatpeople can do with an English
(20:26):
major.
But there are also panels byengineers practicing in the
field.
You might want to double checkthe medical stuff, because I'm
actually teaching at the medicalschool here in the medical
humanities program and I'mwatching the medical students
and they're having a heck of agood time.
It's pretty exciting.
Our effort there is to help youall see how in four, three,
(20:48):
however many years it is fromthe time you graduate to the
time you start looking for acareer or looking for graduate
school or professional programsthat will get you launched is
you know what to expect Because,just like you didn't really
know what was going on when yougot to college, even though you
thought you did, you know allthe stuff you see about how
doctors and lawyers anddifferent kind of folks work on
television is not the way itreally is.
(21:09):
Michaela, you actually went andsat in on classes.
No, not classes, you sat in onnursing.
Speaker 5 (21:17):
Yes.
So one of the hospitals in ourregion has a volunteer program
and so I talked to them about ashadowing position and they kind
of worked it out for me.
Through that volunteer programI was able to be one-on-one with
a nurse for four to eight hoursand volunteer, slash shadow
with her and go in, and actuallyI was in the labor and delivery
(21:38):
department so I got a lot oftraining.
So there are certain areas thatyou can shadow in the hospital
and then, of course, there arecertain areas you cannot.
Course there are certain areasyou cannot, but you can always
talk to those professionals aswell who are in that position
and try to get a day-to-dayschedule of what they might be
doing, even if you can't go seeit in person.
Speaker 2 (21:57):
And the other thing about the career day is that
we've tried to set it up so youcan network with people, and we
want you to literally walk up tosomebody and say my name is
Dominic and I'm interested inbeing an engineer, could you
tell me a little bit about yourcompany, or could I shadow you,
or something like that.
So be your own best advocate,don't be shy, just walk up.
(22:19):
They love it.
We try to recruit people fromall around the city and the
region who have some associationwith UT Tyler, like some of
them are former students andthings like that.
But they're really eager tohelp students, so don't be shy
about talking to them, you know,and that will be really good.
Now I want to ask Michaela totalk a little bit to you, mary,
because you said you could seeyourself in some of your
(22:40):
professors.
Michaela started out thinkingabout being a teacher, like in
elementary school probably, andnow she's teaching college and I
understand from you, dominic,she's not so bad at it.
Speaker 3 (22:50):
No, she's a great teacher.
Speaker 2 (22:53):
She's a great teacher .
So when you made that shift,what made you think, well, maybe
I might try to teach collegeinstead of the younger kids?
What has that turned out to belike for you, Michaela?
Speaker 5 (23:12):
I will say after watching my sister and my mom
teach the primary education.
Speaker 2 (23:14):
So that's pre-K through sixth grade.
I knew that was not what Iwanted to do.
Speaker 5 (23:16):
Why?
What made you think that I amreally student-led,
project-based, with the workthat I like to give to my
students?
I want them to have peer review.
I want them to talk together.
I don't want to be the onegiving them all of their
information.
I think it's really beneficialto get it from my perspective,
but also from a peer'sperspective.
At the same time, and withyounger students who don't quite
(23:39):
know how to use a computer,they don't quite know what
prompts to give to Google andother softwares that we would
use, I can't quite give them thesame autonomy or freedom.
With a presentation or with aproject they may talk with their
group members, and those groupmembers say, if they're in
second grade they may not knowexactly what they're talking
about, right?
(23:59):
So we want to give them thatbase knowledge before we start
with the group style projects.
And so I knew that I wanted towork with older students so that
way I could continue that style.
So I got my bachelor's degree inEnglish education for 7th
through 12th grade.
I have that certificationthrough the state of Texas.
(24:21):
And then, while I was in myvery last semester of that doing
my student teaching fulltimetime, which was in a seventh
grade classroom from 7 30 inthe morning to 4 30 in the
afternoon, every day, mondaythrough Friday.
I absolutely loved those kids,but I still thought there was
more.
I wanted to do with groupprojects and I knew at the
(24:44):
college level I would be able todo that so much better and I
knew from watching in my ownclasses that that was really
where I wanted to take it.
And so it made sense.
Because we have such a greatEnglish master's program here
that was like a stepping stonefrom the bachelor's program I
was already in, it made sensefor me to just continue on with
(25:04):
that and move to the master'sand then get that and hopefully
teach at the college level withthat.
Speaker 2 (25:10):
And how did you end up being a teacher, though?
Because that's one thing to bea grad student, it's another
thing to be a professor.
Speaker 5 (25:15):
Thankfully, ut Tyler does a great job of trying to
match you up with internships,jobs where you can get out in
that field and do what you arehoping to do.
And so here, doing teachingthrough teacher's assistant
positions and things like that,you are able to in our program,
at least through the EnglishMasters program teach a class
(25:38):
under a senior mentor professor.
So the way it works right nowis I am a TA and I teach my
class on my own.
There's no other lecturerprofessor, anything like that in
the room.
But then before class or onanother day throughout the week,
I meet with my senior professorand we go over what happened in
(26:01):
class, what we're going to donext time, what decisions we
made for that class that eitherworked or did not work, and how
can we change that for the nextclass to make it an optimal
learning space for thosestudents, depending on what they
need, Because you can alwaystry to plan or anticipate their
needs, but sometimes it doesn'talways work out.
You don't foresee certainthings happening and you have to
(26:21):
change what you did.
So we're in constantconversation, even though he's
not in the class with me.
Speaker 2 (26:28):
Also, I'll just tell you this, dominic we don't let
just everybody do this.
We knew that she was going tobe good at it and we watched her
and we saw how she could do it.
So, mary, that's something youcan think about possibly doing
For you.
Dominic is looking for being aTA in a program too, so you can
do that.
Now I want to go back to.
I remember some of the thingsyou all said were sort of a
(26:49):
surprise, and we've kind oftalked about that already.
Have you adapted to some of thethings that you said last time
that you thought, oh my Lord,it's so much work and how much
time?
You're getting a lot better atthat now?
Do you feel like you're sort ofrolling along?
Speaker 3 (27:03):
I definitely feel a lot better about my time
management skills and getting mywork done.
You know some of my classes.
They have weekly quizzes and sowhat I try to do is on the
weekends especially.
I try to get them done for theweek and then you know, the
quizzes are done and so I just Imostly need to focus on the
(27:25):
lectures and like taking notesand reviewing for the class.
Speaker 2 (27:28):
So it's written work that's prepared for you to get
ready for the class.
Yes, we have something kind oflike that in my class called the
CPA or the class preparationassignment.
Is that working for you, mary?
Tell me the truth.
If you think they're stupid,let me know.
Speaker 4 (27:50):
No, I honestly like the CPAs, but I wish that I was
better at not procrastinatingdoing them, because you're
supposed to read whatevermaterial you're assigned and
then complete the CPA.
And usually I like toprocrastinate and so I read
really early in the morningbefore class and then do my CPA,
so I don't get to give my fulleffort on the CPAs.
But no, I do enjoy and I likethe whole concept of it.
Speaker 2 (28:07):
One of the things that I've found and this is sort
of advice for all students isthat you have to be fully
engaged with your homeworkbefore you come to a class in
college.
You have to really thoughtabout it for a while and you
have to done a lot more thanjust getting the reading done.
You know, because we're doing alot harder work, and so those
(28:27):
quizzes that your teachers aregiving you and I'm sure that's
exactly what they had in mind isto get you engaged so that when
you show up you've alreadyanswered some of the hard
questions.
A lot of times I will havestudents just look at what they
wrote on their class preparationassignment and just to clarify
what they are is I give thestudents two chapters or four
chapters to read and then I'llask about four questions that
(28:48):
guide them toward what I thinkis important to look at.
You know characterization, whathappened here between these two
characters.
That tells you more aboutwhat's really going on with them
, or what major theme that we'vetalked about in the three weeks
before is popping up here, andthings like that.
So it calls the student into adeeper level of engagement with
the reading.
(29:08):
Now I want to ask you aboutthis?
I ask everybody to read theplot summaries before they read
the novels, and not everybodylikes that idea.
What did you think about that,mary, and do you remember why I
told you to do it?
Speaker 4 (29:20):
Well, I thought it was a good idea because that's
just naturally what I did Likein high school whenever we were
assigned a book.
I would go read the plotsummaries, or I like to watch
the videos, so it's like avisual representation of the
plot.
I did that naturally.
So with those instructions itwas like oh yeah, this is
perfect.
But you told us when we'reinitially reading it's not like,
oh, we're trying to understandthe book, we have sort of a
(29:42):
basic understanding of what'sgoing on, so then we can better
see the main ideas that we'resupposed to like gather.
So I think it's a good see themain ideas that we're supposed
to like gather.
So I think it's a good.
I like the plot summaries andlike getting the summarizations
before we actually start reading.
Speaker 2 (29:54):
You were nodding your head too.
Michaela, Do you want to talkabout that too?
Speaker 5 (29:57):
Sure, yeah.
So I think kind of what Mary issaying is like you anticipate
the key points that are in theCPAs but are also in the
chapters, because you areprepared to look for them and
you know what they're leading upto when you look at the plot
summary or read the plot summarybefore you read the complete
chapter.
If you go through the chapterwithout knowing the full extent
(30:21):
of where it's going to go,sometimes you can get lost in
the little details or you mayhave gone through and you forgot
what you read at the beginningbecause you've already started
focusing on the end.
But when you go through theplot summary, you know what the
story is going to be about forthat section.
So now you can look for thesmaller details.
Speaker 2 (30:39):
Yeah, a lot of times students will look at me and
they'll say, dr Ross, how didyou see that in the poem or the
book?
Because I've read it aboutseven times.
And what I'm trying to teachyou how in literature is not to
appreciate literature but to beable to think critically about
whatever text comes your way.
Teaching you how to do that inEnglish can help you do that in
(30:59):
history, can help you do that inreading the text of society
that's out there in the worldthat you experience.
And so if you have got severalchances to read through it and
get a sense of what's going onfirst off, then when you read it
you know who the characters areahead of time.
You also know that it's headingtowards something and you can
(31:20):
see the foreshadowing, you cansee the moves the writer is
making.
That is making that text workso well for you and it gives you
an idea.
You know when students saywhere'd you get that deep,
hidden meaning?
It's there.
You just didn't know how toread for it and now you're
seeing it.
But you know, I actually got theidea from a student who kind of
(31:41):
like you, mary, who told me Ialways read the book ahead of
time.
I've started adding audio books, and if there's a quality movie
or like there's a BBC series onNorth and South, if you've been
able to watch that, it's welldone enough that I don't mind
students seeing that along withreading it.
Now I also, just so you'll know, dominic, I give them quizzes
(32:02):
that are over the book, and ifthey just read the plot summary
they can't pass the quiz.
So don't worry, we don't givethat away.
So you think you're kind ofrolling along.
How about you, mary?
Because I remember last time Iwas really surprised at how
anxious you seemed.
You don't seem as anxious asyou were five weeks ago, is that
right?
Speaker 4 (32:20):
I think I'm doing a better job of hiding it.
Speaker 2 (32:22):
Oh no.
Speaker 4 (32:24):
I think I hadn't really gotten into like how
college classes were.
It was like the veryintroduction.
It was like, oh you know, Iunderstand you're a first year
student and we're like going totry to ease you into it.
But now that I'm actually likein college and everything like
that, I'm seeing that I'mfinding my own ways to do my
assignments so I'm not asanxious anymore.
But I still do have a hard timespeaking up in class.
(32:45):
I do have a hard time withcriticism and I'm comparing
myself.
I'm trying to compare myself toothers and especially with my
competitiveness with grades.
It's really hard because incollege you don't know how other
kids are doing in a class.
So it's kind of hard to compare.
And for me I don't think I'msuccessful in certain
(33:05):
assignments or certain classesunless I compare myself to
others, which is not a goodthing to do, I know, or like
even a good way to think.
I'm kind of struggling withthat.
But academic-wide, like theassignments and stuff, I feel
like I'm getting it.
But it's just the mentalstruggle of comparing and
everything like that.
Speaker 2 (33:21):
Have you ever heard the phrase comparison is the
thief of joy?
But you know it's kind ofsomething that's baked into
education.
You know you're alwayscomparing yourself and people
talk about the GPA.
The truth is is that professorsdon't worry nearly as much
about the GPA.
What we're worried about is areyou moving upward as you go
along?
And I don't know about all theother teachers I can't speak
(33:42):
about all of them but I try tograde in a way that shows that
if you've achieved what I wantyou to achieve at the end of the
semester, that if you'veachieved what I want you to
achieve at the end of thesemester, that that is more
reflective of what your skill isthan if you floundered around a
little bit at the beginning.
You do want to keep track ofhow others are doing because you
can learn from your classmates.
But worrying about whether ornot you got a 97 and they got a
(34:04):
98 or whatever is not thatproductive, is it?
But the fact that you recognizethat about is it?
Yeah, but you know, the factthat you recognize that about
yourself is a good thing.
You know, one of the things Italk about in class is
Chickering and Reiser's sevenvectors of college development.
Chickering and Reiser are tworesearchers, psychologists and
scholars of learning who havelooked to see the seven things
(34:26):
that all college students haveto go through to get finished,
and the first one, of course, iscompetency, and that's what you
think you're here for.
But after competency, there arethings like interpersonal
relations and developingautonomy, and learning to have a
value system, and learning tocontrol your emotions, but also
to recognize your emotions, andthen, toward the end, it's
(34:47):
coming down to having a sense ofyour personal integrity.
But self-understanding is a bigpart of that time and
self-expression is part of it,but also learning how to be in a
group but not dominate it, butnot be hiding around in the
corners, lurking around, doingnothing.
So it sounds like that's what'shappening to you already, mary,
(35:08):
and I'm really excited to hearthat.
How are you coming along onthis?
Tickering vectors ofdevelopment?
Do you have any idea there,dominic?
Are you thinking about any ofthose?
Speaker 3 (35:17):
I mean, I haven't thought much about it.
Speaker 2 (35:20):
Well, you just told me, though you just told us that
you came to the realizationthat you didn't want to spend
about 12 years in school.
So what did that?
Speaker 3 (35:29):
teach you about yourself.
That taught me for a long time,but I just I found out that I
just didn't want to be in themedical field.
The thing about it was likeI've heard about how sometimes,
you know, it can be a fairlytoxic environment to work in and
you know the hours can bepretty aggressive sometimes as
(35:50):
well, you know not saying otherjobs can't be, but especially in
the medical field.
And so that made me realizethat you know, I don't know if
this is the path for me, and soI thought about it and I thought
about what I enjoyed and what Ilike, and I really like
technology, and so that's why Iwas like, you know, I really
want to work with technology,like that would be great for me.
Speaker 2 (36:12):
Yeah, and see what that tells me is you're doing
exactly what Chickering Rides towant you to do, which is
thinking about you know, whatare your strengths, what are
your talents.
That's an important set ofdecisions, and the fact that
you've moved that far so quicklyis really a great sign to me.
And so now just keep onthinking about those things.
But you know, we do have awriting with technology program
(36:32):
in the English department, don'twe?
Speaker 5 (36:34):
Yes, we do.
That's one of the minors underthe Literature and Languages
department.
So yeah, I can give you someinformation about that.
Speaker 2 (36:41):
And even if you end up being a full STEM guy, a
course like that could be veryuseful too.
There's a lot ofinterdisciplinary things that
are happening along the way.
So, now that you're eight weeksin, one of the things I had my
students do is a self-assessmentof how they thought they were
doing at the beginning, thefirst week, mary, and then in
the seventh week, which youturned in last week, do you
(37:01):
remember which ones you feellike you made the most progress
on?
And this is, by the way, 27skills?
I should get my list out andread them to you.
In fact, I'll give you a copyof it later on, dominic.
But yes, ma'am.
Speaker 4 (37:13):
I don't remember the specific topics that I said I
improved on, but I know for me,I think one of them I'm guessing
here but I think one of themwas like being connected with
the topics you're learning aboutand everything.
Yes, engagement, yes, and Ithink I've seen a big
improvement on myself on that,because in high school I would
(37:34):
just read the books or like I'dlearn about science and I would
just like try to memorizeeverything and make sure I got a
good grade on the test so Icould have good grades.
But now, with the comparingfactor and, like me, not knowing
what other people really aregetting on assignments, I think
I'm able to engage myself morewith the content that I'm like
supposed to be learning and Ilike being able to identify
(37:55):
author's purpose and everythinglike that, because I like that,
not because, oh, I know that'sgoing to be on the test.
So I think that was one of themajor improvements I had.
Speaker 2 (38:03):
But what that is, dominic, is.
I talk to my students a lot andI don't know if you've done
this too in his class, butmetacognition You've heard me
say that word before thinkingabout your thinking, which
usually in your high schoolyou're so busy getting your
grades done and getting yourhomework done and then you know
getting off to do whatever youhave to do after school that you
don't really think about whatyou're learning or how you're
(38:24):
learning.
And one of the best thingsstudents can do is, you know, I
always say take notes and studyyour notes, read your notes.
A lot of students will come toclass.
They don't take notes.
Do you take notes?
Speaker 3 (38:35):
Oh yeah, I take notes .
Speaker 2 (38:36):
Thank God.
I still have to say would youplease get your notes out?
And it's like I'm saying thatto a freshman in college.
I want to scream, but but youknow they have the bad habits
from high school.
What's the worst habit you havefrom high school that you want
to tell your high school friendsto knock off?
Speaker 3 (38:53):
I mean, my worst habit was probably not really
studying, mostly because, like Ididn't need to, you know I
could pass with a high enoughgrade.
But you know here, whenever Igot here, I was like wow, this
is a lot to learn in like whatfeels like a very short amount
of time.
So I'd start working onstudying, like as soon as
possible.
Speaker 2 (39:13):
Now, Mary, I'm not sure that would be the same bad
habit for you, but what would itbe for you?
Speaker 4 (39:24):
Definitely I would advise people not to be so
worried about being competitiveWhile I might have a different
perspective on that now incollege, because I'm not like in
medical school or I'm nottrying to be a lawyer, so grades
really aren't that importantMost of my motivation for
learning things came from oh, Ihave to be better than that
person, or oh, I have to makesure I have the highest GPA so I
can graduate this.
I definitely would advisepeople to leave that mindset as
soon as you walk across thatstage, because that's when your
(39:46):
education becomes more personalwhen you leave like if you're
doing better than other peoplebehind.
Speaker 2 (39:52):
Good attitude, although I will say Mary did get
into our Honors College and shewas valedictorian, so it had
some very proud moments to it.
But you can see that it justgets you past a certain point,
you know.
So now that you're going intothe eighth week, you've got only
six more weeks until thesemester's over.
(40:13):
How's that feel, mary?
Speaker 4 (40:15):
I feel like it feels more exciting because,
especially now, since I'm havingto go to academic advising
appointments, getting ready forregistration, I feel like I have
a better control this timearound, especially with, like,
looking into the next classesI'm going to take, rather than I
did in April of my senior year,when I really didn't know what
I was going to do, just tryingto get out of high school.
(40:36):
So it's more exciting, I think.
Speaker 2 (40:40):
Same thing for you, Dominic.
Speaker 3 (40:41):
Yeah, I mean it's pretty exciting to know like
almost a full semester throughthis, like it honestly caught me
by surprise.
But yeah, I am excited becauseyou know I'm getting advised at
a good time, unlike coming intothis semester.
I don't know if you remember,but I got advised fairly late.
Speaker 2 (40:58):
Yes, you did.
I remember you talked aboutthat, yeah.
Speaker 3 (41:01):
And so you know, just knowing what I want to do and
knowing that I'm going to havepretty good choices for classes,
you know it has me excited forit.
Speaker 2 (41:10):
You know, I think, if I recall, one of the things we
talked about last time was thatyou didn't really know how
important advising was.
You just kind of went, oh, I'mjust going to go to college, and
what you realize is thatthere's all these different
kinds of requirements, hoops youhave to hop through, there's a
lot of administrivia.
As we say that, as much as wehate it, it's part of the state
system and you've got to do it.
(41:30):
And so, knowing, oh, there's areason to do that and get to
your advising appointment earlyRemember, get to them early so
that the good classes won't befilled up you got to do that,
right?
What other kind of pieces ofadvice do you want to pass along
to the friends back in highschool?
Or maybe to that friend downthe hall who's not doing as well
(41:50):
in school as you are?
Speaker 3 (41:52):
Take advantage of the resources you have.
Take advantage of the free timeyou have, of the resources you
have.
Take advantage of the free timeyou have.
My biggest resource is havingthe library.
You know having a dedicatedspace to just go do work in.
You know whether you're like inthe open floor or if you need
like a private area, you knowyou can go into the personal
study rooms.
Take advantage of that.
(42:13):
I've had to use the writingcenter before and you know they
help with papers.
They help you get you on likethe track and kind of get your
ideas and understand what youneed.
They don't edit for you.
They helped me and my group.
We went and they helped us likeget our ideas on the right
track.
We were writing a paper it wasme and one of my group members
(42:35):
and we were trying to likefigure out how we want to get
our ideas together and how tostructure them and the person
there she was able to help usreally get it laid out, like how
she recommends to do it andstuff like that.
Speaker 2 (42:48):
What about librarians ?
Have you used librarians muchyet?
Speaker 3 (42:51):
I haven't.
Speaker 2 (42:52):
I think Mary has Want to tell them about librarians.
Speaker 4 (42:55):
Yeah.
So librarians are much morethan what you would ever expect
before you get to college.
They're the biggest brainiacson the whole entire planet.
I had to schedule anappointment with my specific
librarian because there'sdifferent librarians for each
major and everything like that.
So for my literature andlanguage librarian she was able
to sit me down and she showed methis.
So many like technological,like websites that can help
(43:19):
organize my sources, one beingSciWheel.
She showed me that that's likethe best thing I've ever seen in
my life.
You're able to like organizeall your big beefy academic
articles and everything likethat and organize it and write
notes and cite it, and it's thebest thing ever.
But meeting with her, she'sable to not only like sit there
and tell me like oh, look atthis article for this certain
(43:42):
paper, or whatever, she helpsyou like brainstorm.
Speaker 2 (43:46):
Why don't you tell folks what your project was, so
people can make it more concrete?
Speaker 4 (43:50):
My project was I had to create a PowerPoint for
background information into ourbook North and South, written by
Elizabeth Gaskell.
But my topic was family roles.
So I went up to her and I said,okay, I have this project about
family roles.
I need sources to cite, like Ikind of told her the main idea
of the project and she was ableto sit me down and say well, I
think you should structure itlike this and here are some good
(44:13):
sources and sites that you cango check out and read more about
the importance of the father inthe Victorian England time
period.
But yeah, they're like thesmartest people on the planet.
Speaker 2 (44:23):
They really are, and if you haven't used them yet,
Dominic, be aware that they'rethere and they are dying to help
you.
You know a lot of collegesdon't have research librarians
that are as wonderful as oursand a lot of professors don't
think to use them, but they'resitting there waiting, so be
sure you call on them.
Yeah, Vandy Dubry, she actuallyshe and I planned that project
together so that we know exactlyhow to direct you and we have
(44:47):
things like that, so you shouldbe really happy to know that
news.
Dominic.
Last little things, anythingelse you want to tell us?
I know that you were verynervous about coming here when I
first invited you and when Iasked you to come back, you said
you were happy to do it.
You want to tell us why?
Speaker 4 (45:03):
I feel like this is an opportunity for me to
validate my first year collegeexperience, because when
everyone asks about college,it's like oh, how are you doing?
The first instinct is to belike I'm doing good, no one
needs to help me, I'm literallyhaving the best time ever.
But in reality, a lot of peopleare struggling.
It's a normal thing to struggle.
So I feel like this being ableto talk with another first year
student and talking with mentorslike you guys it's so
(45:27):
validating to like see, it'sokay to struggle and it's okay
to experience this bigexperience for the first time in
your life.
Speaker 2 (45:36):
I about you, Dominic.
You didn't mind coming backeither, huh.
Speaker 3 (45:39):
No, I didn't.
I've been looking for ways toconnect with people on campus
and, you know, get to know themmore personally, and I think
this has been like a great wayto connect with another first
year, connect with my professor,connect with you, just be able
to connect with everybody, andit's been really nice.
Speaker 2 (46:01):
Yeah, and in fact that's one of the things that a
lot of times students strugglewith is connecting at first, you
know, especially when you'refar from home.
So we're going to probablyinvite you back to hear how
you're doing.
It may end up being a series.
We may just have to follow themall the way till graduation.
I don't know so well.
That was pretty interesting.
I enjoyed that.
I guess that's a wrap, ashley.
Speaker 6 (46:19):
Yes, ma'am, this has been the Ask Dr Ross podcast.
Thank you so much for listeningin with us today, and if you
have questions about collegelife or any of the topics that
we were talking about today,please send us your questions to
adrquestions at gmailcom.
We'd love to hear from you.
In the meanwhile, we'll see youin the next episode.
Thank you very much.
This is Ashley Wortley signingoff.
(46:41):
Bye-bye.
Stay tuned to the Ask Dr Ross podcast.
It's created to give you infoto succeed at college.
Our hosts are highly qualified.
Dr Catherine Ross is a memberof the University of Texas
System's Academy ofDistinguished Teachers.
She's also a popular professorof 19th century English
literature.
Ask Dr Ross is a communityservice of the University of
(00:27):
Texas at Tyler.
Speaker 2 (00:30):
Well, I'm happy to see you both here this afternoon
again.
This is our second episode withour first-year students.
We don't call you freshmenanymore, you have to be a
first-year person, and what wewanted to do is, after a few
more weeks of class, we wantedto interview you again and hear
what you have learned in thetime since we first met you.
So I'll ask you each tointroduce yourself and remind us
(00:54):
what your name is, where yourhometown is and what your major
is, if you know.
So we'll start with Dominic.
Speaker 3 (01:03):
My name's Dominic.
I'm from Midland originally andactually I've switched majors
since the last time we had thismeeting, so before I was pre-med
.
But I made a pretty big shiftto electrical engineering.
Speaker 2 (01:19):
Wow, well, we'll be talking about that shortly.
Great Dominic Mary.
Speaker 4 (01:24):
So my name's Mary, my hometown is Jacksonville, texas
, and I've kept my major I'mstill majoring in English.
Speaker 2 (01:31):
Well, of course, it's the best major on the campus,
right?
So you're from a really faraway, dominic.
How's that been being that farfrom home after what?
Eight weeks now?
Speaker 3 (01:41):
It hasn't been bad.
I've gone home for one weekendso far, but I've actually
adjusted quite well.
I would say, you know, I'vegotten into a pretty good
schedule, Like I keep in touchwith my family, Like I still
call them all the time, and youknow, I've just I've adapted to
it, I'm used to it now.
Speaker 2 (01:59):
Do you have pretty busy weekends here?
Speaker 3 (02:01):
My weekends aren't normally too busy, but I mean, I
do spend them trying to getahead in classes usually, and
I'm not just saying that either,but that's mostly what I do on
the weekends.
Speaker 2 (02:13):
Dominic's teacher is here, so he's.
Are you being careful aboutwhat you say in front of your
teacher?
Speaker 3 (02:18):
No, if anything, she probably knows what my work
ethic is like.
Speaker 2 (02:23):
You're welcome to comment on that, Michaela.
Speaker 5 (02:26):
He is a great student .
I'm sure he's doing exactlywhat he needs to do.
Speaker 2 (02:30):
Mary is also here and she's, of course, my student,
so she's being careful what shesays to me.
But you know you can saywhatever you want, so talk about
how things are changing becauseyou're from Jacksonville so
you're real close to home.
Do you go home every weekend?
Speaker 4 (02:43):
For the most part.
It's not every weekend I goback home, but it's like maybe
every other weekend.
My best friend from my hometown, she went to Sam Houston.
So sometimes when she comes upI usually go home and I do a
visit like that.
But I try to stay on campus asmuch as I can because I feel I
want that autonomy to live bymyself and my mom's like, oh,
(03:03):
come home, but it's like I movedaway for a reason, so let me
stay on campus.
But yeah, maybe every otherweekend I go back home.
Speaker 2 (03:12):
How about you?
Speaker 3 (03:13):
Did you move away for autonomy For a little bit?
I was excited to get out and beable to kind of just live life,
see what it was like.
I didn't expect to go as far asI did, but you know I enjoy it
here.
It's nice.
Speaker 2 (03:25):
Well now, folks who haven't heard our previous
interview don't know why youcame so far away.
You want to tell this audiencewhy you came all the way from
West Texas to Far East Texas.
That's like going across twostates in some places.
Speaker 3 (03:42):
Midland.
It's an okay place.
You know it's not the bestlooking.
Really that was a big thing.
But also I was ready for achange.
Like I've lived in West Texasmy whole life, only saw like one
type of area, only lived inMidland Really flat, hot, mm-hmm
.
And so I was ready to come to adifferent place and Tyler was
great because it's green here,you know, there's like rolling
hills everywhere, lots of trees,and I'm just like you know.
(04:05):
I was very happy.
Speaker 2 (04:07):
You know, a lot of people don't realize how much of
a difference a campus can make.
You know the place and, ofcourse, you both live here on
campus, right, and where youlive, and which apartments or
dorm.
I live in Ornelas Hall, thefirst-year student's dorm.
What about you, mary?
Same First year student's dorm.
What about you, mary?
Same?
Yeah, I am too.
Yeah, how is the dorm lifetreating you Mary?
Speaker 4 (04:26):
I love my dorm.
Actually I have one of thethree bedroom suites so I have
like my own room.
So it's not technically a dormexperience like every other
college, but it's somewhat.
One of my roommates is the RA.
Ra is the residential assistantand pretty much it's like the
(04:46):
dorm police, but she's superchill.
But she does like health andsafety checks, which is like
going into the other people onmy floors, dorms, and checks
that make sure like they're notbreaking any rules.
So having her as a roommatekind of is like a different
experience, I guess, becauseshe's a junior, not a freshman,
so it's a different perspectiveon college.
But yeah, I love my dorm, likeabsolutely love it.
Speaker 2 (05:07):
Just a little side note here.
The health and safety checksare to make sure things like you
don't have 16 things pluggedinto one outlet and are about to
start the place on fire oryou're keeping things clean,
things like that.
So it may feel like a littlebit of an intrusion, but it's
actually for your safety, isn'tit?
And does she do it fairlydiscreetly?
Speaker 4 (05:25):
Well, she doesn't do the health and safety checks on
our dorm because it's like shecould just like let stuff slide.
So we actually have the wholeRA director for the whole entire
building come into our dorm.
So it's like we have to makesure our stuff is tippity-top
good in shape.
But I feel like us threebecause I have two other
roommates, an RA and thenanother freshman I feel like we
(05:46):
do a pretty good job keeping ourstuff in check.
Speaker 2 (05:49):
How's your dorm going , Dominic?
Speaker 3 (05:51):
It hasn't been bad at all.
You know I also am in athree-person suite.
I'm not with the RA, you know,I'm with two other first-year
students and we actually hangout quite a bit.
Like earlier this week we wentto Walmart with another friend,
you know, and we were just kindof messing around because my
friend, he wanted to go shoppingfor his frat because he needed
to, and so we went and did thatwith him.
(06:13):
And you know we go out to eatsometimes and we just kind of
hang out.
Speaker 2 (06:16):
Now are freshmen allowed to have cars here.
Speaker 3 (06:18):
Yes.
Speaker 2 (06:19):
Because a lot of times the first year students
will not be allowed to haveautomobiles for various reasons.
But if y'all have cars, you'repretty mobile.
Then you are pretty autonomous,aren't you?
So what we asked you early onwas did you think you were well
prepared from high school forcollege?
And do you remember what yousaid last time, dominic?
And then we'll go to Mary.
Speaker 3 (06:39):
I think I said that I was kind of prepared because in
high school you know,everything was super structured.
I didn't have to do anythingoutside of my classes, really
Like I hardly had any classwork,any homework like anything
outside of my classes, and thatwas really like the biggest
shock about getting here.
Speaker 2 (06:57):
Yeah, what about you, mary?
Do you remember what you said?
Speaker 4 (07:05):
I'm pretty sure I probably said I was somewhat
prepared, but now I know that Iwas definitely like,
academically prepared.
I knew that I chose the rightmajor because of my high school
classes and I feel like myeducational academics and high
school prepared me well butmentally, having like all the
autonomy and everything likethat, I definitely was not
prepared from high school.
It's a completely differentshift and I don't know, I feel
like it's such a different thingcollege and high school that it
(07:26):
really couldn't even haveprepared me mentally.
Speaker 2 (07:29):
So when you say such a big shift, what are some of
the ways that feels like?
So if you're talking to some ofthe kids back in your high
school that you know you look atit it's different.
But can you tell them what someof the details might be?
Speaker 4 (07:41):
For the biggest shifts.
Shifts it's like everything isindependent.
So while that might sound likesuch a dream in high school
because like, oh, you don't haveto listen to anyone you still
have to, like, have thatself-control to get business
things done.
Because if you don't have thatself-control then it's not going
to get done and then it's onyou, you get in trouble and it's
.
It's not a good thing.
So I feel like, while it's likesuch a pretty picture in high,
(08:04):
I would tell the kids back in myhigh school it is fun, but you
still have to have a balance.
You have to be prepared tobalance business things and fun
things.
Speaker 2 (08:13):
There's a lot more work in there.
Yeah, I know Dominic wasnodding his head about that,
weren't you?
Speaker 3 (08:18):
Yeah, that was the biggest thing was just trying to
get myself on a schedule thatmakes sense to me and is still
structured, and so that's thebiggest thing.
I would tell anybody back at myhigh schools.
I'd be like you're going tohave free time unless you're
taking like 30 hours of classes,but you're going to have free
(08:38):
time and you need to figure outhow to use that free time in a
productive way.
You can't just be like oh, Iwent to classes, I'm just going
to go sit in my room.
Speaker 2 (08:47):
You know, one of the things we tell students is for
every hour you spend in class,you should spend three hours
outside of class.
Now when we do research onwhether or not students really
do that, usually the ones whoget closest to that are the ones
that are making A's and maybeB's, the ones who just kind of
do a little bit.
You know about an hour for anhour.
(09:08):
A lot of times they're notdoing as well as you think.
This is a whole different levelof information gathering of
information, retrieval ofapplication of that material.
Have you found that you'regetting close to that amount of
work for every hour or have youeven thought about it like those
numbers?
Speaker 3 (09:25):
You probably haven't, but I feel like I get kind of
close to those numbers.
I don't think of it as, likeyou know, three hours
specifically.
I just think of it as if I doat least a little bit every day.
That's a lot better than justbeing like, oh, I'm going to do
it all in one day.
Speaker 2 (09:45):
And you know, and that normally doesn't work out,
yeah yeah, pedagogically, if youspread it out a little bit of
time, a little bit of timeretrieve, remind, and you know,
when you break it up, then whenyou start, come back the second
time, you have to kind of reviewwhat you did the first day and
kind of catch up and then youmove on like that.
Now you just broke someinteresting news, you have
changed your major, and I alwaystell my first year students
look out, it's going to happenand it's okay, so let's hear
(10:07):
about that.
Speaker 3 (10:09):
The biggest thing that made me want to change was
just the amount of time inschool.
You know, in order to be adoctor, it's around like eight
years and then after that youhave to spend another like four
years in residency, and there'snothing wrong with that Like I
have a lot of respect for peoplethat do that but that's not
something that I personally wantto do.
Like I want to get my education.
(10:31):
You know, possibly get amaster's I haven't thought about
that yet but just, you know,get the education and start
building up my talent.
Getting skilled at somethingand engineering is more of like
a it's going going to sound kindof mean, but like you build
your skills, more to it.
Like you don't just knoweverything, like you just kind
of you build up, like how tothink through things and how to
(10:53):
think super critically.
Speaker 2 (10:55):
There's nothing mean about that.
I mean, what you're describingis the way a discipline works.
Have you been taking anengineering class this semester
or are you just kind of guessing?
Speaker 3 (11:03):
I haven't taken an engineering class this semester,
or are you just kind ofguessing?
I haven't taken an engineeringclass this semester, so I am
just kind of guessing right now.
Speaker 2 (11:09):
Okay, well, that's interesting.
How did you discover that, allof a sudden, medicine was going
to be too many years of school?
How did you learn that?
Speaker 3 (11:16):
It was mostly cost is what I thought about.
After this semester I saw howmuch college is, even with
scholarships and get like it'sstill it's not going to be free
for me, and so I wanted to kindof get through, get the skills
that I needed and just likestart, like building myself.
Speaker 2 (11:37):
Now, this is not to suggest that you have to pay
more money and be better, butone of the things I was going to
say is that all the researchthat's been done about when
people get things for free andwhen things have to work for
things ie earn the money to getthere that actually you tend to
take it more seriously becauseyou've got more skin in the game
.
And so, while I don't want anyof you all to go into debt going
(12:00):
through college, the fact thatit does cost some money is part
of what helps to keep youmotivated to keep going.
And I often say to my studentswho are flaking off I say do you
realize how many dollars youjust wasted this week by not
doing your homework?
I strongly recommend you getyourself over to the engineering
department and start talking tosome of those students.
First, find out who the goodteachers are and this is always
(12:22):
a key thing, especially yourvery first class in a field.
Find out who the best teachersare, because a lot of times what
you think the course is goingto be like and what is going to
be covered is different, and soif you have a teacher who
renders whatever that materialis in ways that other students
have recognized as reallyvaluable and helpful, then that
(12:43):
will help you firm up thatdecision.
What about you, mary?
So you said that you're justfine with your English major.
That makes me very happy, butyou want to tell the audience
here just kind of why you findthat the English major is
working for you.
Speaker 4 (12:59):
Now, even though I'm a first-year student, I'm taking
only major specific Englishclasses.
Some are prereqs for my majorbut they're mainly just
specifically English andthroughout those classes I've
kind of like found they're notnecessarily easy, but like I'm
getting my assignments done andI think I'm getting them done
well but I'm also enjoying theactual content.
(13:20):
So I feel like that kind ofsolidified my decision on
staying in English and beingable to see all my professors
like teaching what they love andeverything.
It's just like I see myself inall my professors.
I'm like, yeah, that's what Iwant to do.
Speaker 2 (13:33):
Oh, that's great news .
That's great news.
So you're taking four Englishclasses.
Speaker 4 (13:37):
Let's see, I'm taking a literature class, a writing
class.
I have my honors world textimage class, which is, I
consider, a writing class, ispretty much what we do.
So I guess I'm only takingthree English classes and then I
have an education class.
Speaker 2 (13:52):
That's a good thing to do is to check out to see,
because a lot of times peoplethink English majors will become
teachers.
Not all of us do.
Some of us do something elseand then we come back to
teaching or we teach differentlevels.
But that's a good thing to testit out a little bit to see what
that other discipline is like.
That's why I was saying to you,dominic, be sure that you take
at least one engineering classbefore you get too far down the
line.
Now, mary, you came in with alot of prereqs done right
(14:15):
Because you'd done a lot of dualcredit right and had you done
any dual credit much.
Speaker 3 (14:20):
I didn't do any dual credit, I did only AP classes.
Speaker 2 (14:26):
So with AP classes you get credit right.
So did you start as a sophomorethen?
Speaker 3 (14:32):
No, I got very few AP credits honestly.
I mean, I still came inbasically as a freshman just a
few hours ahead of everybody.
Speaker 2 (14:41):
And actually I wanted to point this out to anybody
who's listening is that both ofyou kind of examples of two
different ways of going tocollege.
Some folks are getting a lot ofit quote out of the way, which
always bothers me as a professor, that you think that those
earlier classes are.
You're getting them out of theway because what they are is the
core curriculum.
Michaela, did you have a lot ofyour hours out of the way
before you started and became aprofessor here?
Speaker 5 (15:04):
I did when I started here.
No, sorry, when I started atTJC with my associates, by the
time I graduated high school Ialready had 44 hours out of the
way out of my 60 for myassociates, so I was almost done
.
I stayed in college about ayear after high school for my
associates.
I stayed in college about ayear after high school for my
associates.
Speaker 2 (15:24):
So you really sped up the process and in your case,
you're taking it a little bitslower in the sense.
But you're also here's the bigdifference Mary who taught your
college classes when you were inhigh school.
Speaker 4 (15:38):
My English class it was actually like a co-professor
, but all my other ones werejust high school teachers.
Speaker 2 (15:44):
High school teachers.
Okay, so you're getting yourcore classes taught by college
professors, and that can be aquantitative difference.
It may not always be.
Some of the high schoolteachers are fabulous and I
think in order to teach thoseclasses, they have to have 18
hours of graduate school in thefield.
So I'm not going to denigrateany of those folks, but the
(16:05):
difference is that you weretaking it on a high school
schedule, and the high schoolschedule is so different from a
college, as you've learned right, you have classes every other
day sometimes, or it's just anhour a day, and then two hours
later on, and there's all thisfree time in there, and so we
can give you more complexassignments.
That's why we get the threehours in.
You know you got to spend onehour with us and three hours
studying In high school.
That's not possible, and sothere's a different level there,
(16:27):
and while I think there's anadvantage in both and I'm not
going to come down on either oneI do want to point out that
Mary saved a lot of money andtime and she's gone straight
into her major.
Thank goodness, it was the oneyou wanted.
Imagine if you'd started.
Dominic went straight in andyou went oh my gosh, I don't
want to be a doctor after all.
So you're in a perfect positiontoo, so you can be studying and
(16:51):
looking around and see what youwant to study and also taking
as many of those core classes aspossible right now.
So you get a sense of well, doI like history?
Do I like philosophy?
Do I like the STEM classes?
Michaela, do you want to addanything?
Speaker 5 (17:04):
Yeah.
So that's actually one of thebiggest pieces of advice that I
always give seniors in highschool or freshmen, especially
in like my 1301 class and atthat level, is do as much as you
possibly can to see what thejob you think you want as well
as the major you think you wantis doing or is about.
(17:25):
Because, like I said in thegraduate podcast, I actually
started in nursing when I got toTJC and I decided when I was
there, after shadowing at thehospital, after doing the
workload through anatomy andphysiology classes, that it
wasn't enough.
With people, the job was great,and for other people who want
to do that sort of thing, thenthat is a't enough.
With people, the job was great,and for other people who want
(17:46):
to do that sort of thing, thenthat is a wonderful job for them
.
But for me it was not enoughinteraction with people on the
day to day.
It was a lot of computer, itwas a lot of math and I didn't
want to go that route.
I wanted to do more English,more people to people, and so I
was on the fence when I startedschool and, once again, having
44 hours, my basics were alreadyout of the way, so I didn't
(18:07):
have a lot of time to decidewhat I wanted to do out of high
school.
I just had to jump intosomething, which is great for
people who know what they wantto do, but if they don't then
it's a little bit of adisadvantage at times.
So I jumped into nursing,decided that's not what I want
to do, but thankfully TJC has aninterdisciplinary studies
(18:29):
associates that I was able toget and move to UT Tyler for my
bachelor's to start the Englisheducation program here course.
I've loved it and stuck with it.
But before I even started at UTTyler doing education I went
and applied to be a substituteteacher.
So I put myself into theclassroom before I even took
(18:51):
those classes.
That way I would know is thiswhat I want to jump into before
I got to UT Tyler.
Speaker 2 (18:57):
Also, don't you have the advantage of having a mother
and a sister who've beeneducators?
Speaker 5 (19:01):
I do yes.
So my mom was a teacher for 28years and my sister has been a
teacher for, I believe, sevenyears at this point.
So my sister teaches elementary.
So she is taught anywhere fromsecond to fifth grade PE, social
studies, english, a lot ofdifferent subjects.
And then my mom taughtpreschool and fifth grade in
(19:23):
elementaries throughout her 20years.
Speaker 2 (19:25):
So, Dominic, maybe you ought to start looking for a
chance to kind of visit someengineering situations.
We have all sorts ofopportunities for internships
that are being investigated.
But I want to tell you bothabout something Next week is our
Career Success Day, and it'ssomething we've been doing for
quite some time.
Day on Thursday, the 24th, andthere will be starting out with
(19:51):
a speaker who's going to talk toyou all about launching a
career.
Speaker 5 (19:56):
He's one of the founders, I believe, of LinkedIn
, so he knows a lot about how toget into the workforce.
Speaker 2 (20:03):
And then there are going to be all these panels.
There are going to be twosections of panels.
For example, there's one onEnglish majors who are doing
different things.
One of them is a former studentof mine who became a president
of a company largely because ofhis writing skills.
One is an editor, I believe.
I'm not sure what the other twojobs are, but it's an
interesting thing to see whatpeople can do with an English
(20:26):
major.
But there are also panels byengineers practicing in the
field.
You might want to double checkthe medical stuff, because I'm
actually teaching at the medicalschool here in the medical
humanities program and I'mwatching the medical students
and they're having a heck of agood time.
It's pretty exciting.
Our effort there is to help youall see how in four, three,
(20:48):
however many years it is fromthe time you graduate to the
time you start looking for acareer or looking for graduate
school or professional programsthat will get you launched is
you know what to expect Because,just like you didn't really
know what was going on when yougot to college, even though you
thought you did, you know allthe stuff you see about how
doctors and lawyers anddifferent kind of folks work on
television is not the way itreally is.
(21:09):
Michaela, you actually went andsat in on classes.
No, not classes, you sat in onnursing.
Speaker 5 (21:17):
Yes.
So one of the hospitals in ourregion has a volunteer program
and so I talked to them about ashadowing position and they kind
of worked it out for me.
Through that volunteer programI was able to be one-on-one with
a nurse for four to eight hoursand volunteer, slash shadow
with her and go in, and actuallyI was in the labor and delivery
(21:38):
department so I got a lot oftraining.
So there are certain areas thatyou can shadow in the hospital
and then, of course, there arecertain areas you cannot.
Course there are certain areasyou cannot, but you can always
talk to those professionals aswell who are in that position
and try to get a day-to-dayschedule of what they might be
doing, even if you can't go seeit in person.
Speaker 2 (21:57):
And the other thing about the career day is that
we've tried to set it up so youcan network with people, and we
want you to literally walk up tosomebody and say my name is
Dominic and I'm interested inbeing an engineer, could you
tell me a little bit about yourcompany, or could I shadow you,
or something like that.
So be your own best advocate,don't be shy, just walk up.
(22:19):
They love it.
We try to recruit people fromall around the city and the
region who have some associationwith UT Tyler, like some of
them are former students andthings like that.
But they're really eager tohelp students, so don't be shy
about talking to them, you know,and that will be really good.
Now I want to ask Michaela totalk a little bit to you, mary,
because you said you could seeyourself in some of your
(22:40):
professors.
Michaela started out thinkingabout being a teacher, like in
elementary school probably, andnow she's teaching college and I
understand from you, dominic,she's not so bad at it.
Speaker 3 (22:50):
No, she's a great teacher.
Speaker 2 (22:53):
She's a great teacher .
So when you made that shift,what made you think, well, maybe
I might try to teach collegeinstead of the younger kids?
What has that turned out to belike for you, Michaela?
Speaker 5 (23:12):
I will say after watching my sister and my mom
teach the primary education.
Speaker 2 (23:14):
So that's pre-K through sixth grade.
I knew that was not what Iwanted to do.
Speaker 5 (23:16):
Why?
What made you think that I amreally student-led,
project-based, with the workthat I like to give to my
students?
I want them to have peer review.
I want them to talk together.
I don't want to be the onegiving them all of their
information.
I think it's really beneficialto get it from my perspective,
but also from a peer'sperspective.
At the same time, and withyounger students who don't quite
(23:39):
know how to use a computer,they don't quite know what
prompts to give to Google andother softwares that we would
use, I can't quite give them thesame autonomy or freedom.
With a presentation or with aproject they may talk with their
group members, and those groupmembers say, if they're in
second grade they may not knowexactly what they're talking
about, right?
(23:59):
So we want to give them thatbase knowledge before we start
with the group style projects.
And so I knew that I wanted towork with older students so that
way I could continue that style.
So I got my bachelor's degree inEnglish education for 7th
through 12th grade.
I have that certificationthrough the state of Texas.
(24:21):
And then, while I was in myvery last semester of that doing
my student teaching fulltimetime, which was in a seventh
grade classroom from 7 30 inthe morning to 4 30 in the
afternoon, every day, mondaythrough Friday.
I absolutely loved those kids,but I still thought there was
more.
I wanted to do with groupprojects and I knew at the
(24:44):
college level I would be able todo that so much better and I
knew from watching in my ownclasses that that was really
where I wanted to take it.
And so it made sense.
Because we have such a greatEnglish master's program here
that was like a stepping stonefrom the bachelor's program I
was already in, it made sensefor me to just continue on with
(25:04):
that and move to the master'sand then get that and hopefully
teach at the college level withthat.
Speaker 2 (25:10):
And how did you end up being a teacher, though?
Because that's one thing to bea grad student, it's another
thing to be a professor.
Speaker 5 (25:15):
Thankfully, ut Tyler does a great job of trying to
match you up with internships,jobs where you can get out in
that field and do what you arehoping to do.
And so here, doing teachingthrough teacher's assistant
positions and things like that,you are able to in our program,
at least through the EnglishMasters program teach a class
(25:38):
under a senior mentor professor.
So the way it works right nowis I am a TA and I teach my
class on my own.
There's no other lecturerprofessor, anything like that in
the room.
But then before class or onanother day throughout the week,
I meet with my senior professorand we go over what happened in
(26:01):
class, what we're going to donext time, what decisions we
made for that class that eitherworked or did not work, and how
can we change that for the nextclass to make it an optimal
learning space for thosestudents, depending on what they
need, Because you can alwaystry to plan or anticipate their
needs, but sometimes it doesn'talways work out.
You don't foresee certainthings happening and you have to
(26:21):
change what you did.
So we're in constantconversation, even though he's
not in the class with me.
Speaker 2 (26:28):
Also, I'll just tell you this, dominic we don't let
just everybody do this.
We knew that she was going tobe good at it and we watched her
and we saw how she could do it.
So, mary, that's something youcan think about possibly doing
For you.
Dominic is looking for being aTA in a program too, so you can
do that.
Now I want to go back to.
I remember some of the thingsyou all said were sort of a
(26:49):
surprise, and we've kind oftalked about that already.
Have you adapted to some of thethings that you said last time
that you thought, oh my Lord,it's so much work and how much
time?
You're getting a lot better atthat now?
Do you feel like you're sort ofrolling along?
Speaker 3 (27:03):
I definitely feel a lot better about my time
management skills and getting mywork done.
You know some of my classes.
They have weekly quizzes and sowhat I try to do is on the
weekends especially.
I try to get them done for theweek and then you know, the
quizzes are done and so I just Imostly need to focus on the
(27:25):
lectures and like taking notesand reviewing for the class.
Speaker 2 (27:28):
So it's written work that's prepared for you to get
ready for the class.
Yes, we have something kind oflike that in my class called the
CPA or the class preparationassignment.
Is that working for you, mary?
Tell me the truth.
If you think they're stupid,let me know.
Speaker 4 (27:50):
No, I honestly like the CPAs, but I wish that I was
better at not procrastinatingdoing them, because you're
supposed to read whatevermaterial you're assigned and
then complete the CPA.
And usually I like toprocrastinate and so I read
really early in the morningbefore class and then do my CPA,
so I don't get to give my fulleffort on the CPAs.
But no, I do enjoy and I likethe whole concept of it.
Speaker 2 (28:07):
One of the things that I've found and this is sort
of advice for all students isthat you have to be fully
engaged with your homeworkbefore you come to a class in
college.
You have to really thoughtabout it for a while and you
have to done a lot more thanjust getting the reading done.
You know, because we're doing alot harder work, and so those
(28:27):
quizzes that your teachers aregiving you and I'm sure that's
exactly what they had in mind isto get you engaged so that when
you show up you've alreadyanswered some of the hard
questions.
A lot of times I will havestudents just look at what they
wrote on their class preparationassignment and just to clarify
what they are is I give thestudents two chapters or four
chapters to read and then I'llask about four questions that
(28:48):
guide them toward what I thinkis important to look at.
You know characterization, whathappened here between these two
characters.
That tells you more aboutwhat's really going on with them
, or what major theme that we'vetalked about in the three weeks
before is popping up here, andthings like that.
So it calls the student into adeeper level of engagement with
the reading.
(29:08):
Now I want to ask you aboutthis?
I ask everybody to read theplot summaries before they read
the novels, and not everybodylikes that idea.
What did you think about that,mary, and do you remember why I
told you to do it?
Speaker 4 (29:20):
Well, I thought it was a good idea because that's
just naturally what I did Likein high school whenever we were
assigned a book.
I would go read the plotsummaries, or I like to watch
the videos, so it's like avisual representation of the
plot.
I did that naturally.
So with those instructions itwas like oh yeah, this is
perfect.
But you told us when we'reinitially reading it's not like,
oh, we're trying to understandthe book, we have sort of a
(29:42):
basic understanding of what'sgoing on, so then we can better
see the main ideas that we'resupposed to like gather.
So I think it's a good see themain ideas that we're supposed
to like gather.
So I think it's a good.
I like the plot summaries andlike getting the summarizations
before we actually start reading.
Speaker 2 (29:54):
You were nodding your head too.
Michaela, Do you want to talkabout that too?
Speaker 5 (29:57):
Sure, yeah.
So I think kind of what Mary issaying is like you anticipate
the key points that are in theCPAs but are also in the
chapters, because you areprepared to look for them and
you know what they're leading upto when you look at the plot
summary or read the plot summarybefore you read the complete
chapter.
If you go through the chapterwithout knowing the full extent
(30:21):
of where it's going to go,sometimes you can get lost in
the little details or you mayhave gone through and you forgot
what you read at the beginningbecause you've already started
focusing on the end.
But when you go through theplot summary, you know what the
story is going to be about forthat section.
So now you can look for thesmaller details.
Speaker 2 (30:39):
Yeah, a lot of times students will look at me and
they'll say, dr Ross, how didyou see that in the poem or the
book?
Because I've read it aboutseven times.
And what I'm trying to teachyou how in literature is not to
appreciate literature but to beable to think critically about
whatever text comes your way.
Teaching you how to do that inEnglish can help you do that in
(30:59):
history, can help you do that inreading the text of society
that's out there in the worldthat you experience.
And so if you have got severalchances to read through it and
get a sense of what's going onfirst off, then when you read it
you know who the characters areahead of time.
You also know that it's headingtowards something and you can
(31:20):
see the foreshadowing, you cansee the moves the writer is
making.
That is making that text workso well for you and it gives you
an idea.
You know when students saywhere'd you get that deep,
hidden meaning?
It's there.
You just didn't know how toread for it and now you're
seeing it.
But you know, I actually got theidea from a student who kind of
(31:41):
like you, mary, who told me Ialways read the book ahead of
time.
I've started adding audio books, and if there's a quality movie
or like there's a BBC series onNorth and South, if you've been
able to watch that, it's welldone enough that I don't mind
students seeing that along withreading it.
Now I also, just so you'll know, dominic, I give them quizzes
(32:02):
that are over the book, and ifthey just read the plot summary
they can't pass the quiz.
So don't worry, we don't givethat away.
So you think you're kind ofrolling along.
How about you, mary?
Because I remember last time Iwas really surprised at how
anxious you seemed.
You don't seem as anxious asyou were five weeks ago, is that
right?
Speaker 4 (32:20):
I think I'm doing a better job of hiding it.
Speaker 2 (32:22):
Oh no.
Speaker 4 (32:24):
I think I hadn't really gotten into like how
college classes were.
It was like the veryintroduction.
It was like, oh you know, Iunderstand you're a first year
student and we're like going totry to ease you into it.
But now that I'm actually likein college and everything like
that, I'm seeing that I'mfinding my own ways to do my
assignments so I'm not asanxious anymore.
But I still do have a hard timespeaking up in class.
(32:45):
I do have a hard time withcriticism and I'm comparing
myself.
I'm trying to compare myself toothers and especially with my
competitiveness with grades.
It's really hard because incollege you don't know how other
kids are doing in a class.
So it's kind of hard to compare.
And for me I don't think I'msuccessful in certain
(33:05):
assignments or certain classesunless I compare myself to
others, which is not a goodthing to do, I know, or like
even a good way to think.
I'm kind of struggling withthat.
But academic-wide, like theassignments and stuff, I feel
like I'm getting it.
But it's just the mentalstruggle of comparing and
everything like that.
Speaker 2 (33:21):
Have you ever heard the phrase comparison is the
thief of joy?
But you know it's kind ofsomething that's baked into
education.
You know you're alwayscomparing yourself and people
talk about the GPA.
The truth is is that professorsdon't worry nearly as much
about the GPA.
What we're worried about is areyou moving upward as you go
along?
And I don't know about all theother teachers I can't speak
(33:42):
about all of them but I try tograde in a way that shows that
if you've achieved what I wantyou to achieve at the end of the
semester, that if you'veachieved what I want you to
achieve at the end of thesemester, that that is more
reflective of what your skill isthan if you floundered around a
little bit at the beginning.
You do want to keep track ofhow others are doing because you
can learn from your classmates.
But worrying about whether ornot you got a 97 and they got a
(34:04):
98 or whatever is not thatproductive, is it?
But the fact that you recognizethat about is it?
Yeah, but you know, the factthat you recognize that about
yourself is a good thing.
You know, one of the things Italk about in class is
Chickering and Reiser's sevenvectors of college development.
Chickering and Reiser are tworesearchers, psychologists and
scholars of learning who havelooked to see the seven things
(34:26):
that all college students haveto go through to get finished,
and the first one, of course, iscompetency, and that's what you
think you're here for.
But after competency, there arethings like interpersonal
relations and developingautonomy, and learning to have a
value system, and learning tocontrol your emotions, but also
to recognize your emotions, andthen, toward the end, it's
(34:47):
coming down to having a sense ofyour personal integrity.
But self-understanding is a bigpart of that time and
self-expression is part of it,but also learning how to be in a
group but not dominate it, butnot be hiding around in the
corners, lurking around, doingnothing.
So it sounds like that's what'shappening to you already, mary,
(35:08):
and I'm really excited to hearthat.
How are you coming along onthis?
Tickering vectors ofdevelopment?
Do you have any idea there,dominic?
Are you thinking about any ofthose?
Speaker 3 (35:17):
I mean, I haven't thought much about it.
Speaker 2 (35:20):
Well, you just told me, though you just told us that
you came to the realizationthat you didn't want to spend
about 12 years in school.
So what did that?
Speaker 3 (35:29):
teach you about yourself.
That taught me for a long time,but I just I found out that I
just didn't want to be in themedical field.
The thing about it was likeI've heard about how sometimes,
you know, it can be a fairlytoxic environment to work in and
you know the hours can bepretty aggressive sometimes as
(35:50):
well, you know not saying otherjobs can't be, but especially in
the medical field.
And so that made me realizethat you know, I don't know if
this is the path for me, and soI thought about it and I thought
about what I enjoyed and what Ilike, and I really like
technology, and so that's why Iwas like, you know, I really
want to work with technology,like that would be great for me.
Speaker 2 (36:12):
Yeah, and see what that tells me is you're doing
exactly what Chickering Rides towant you to do, which is
thinking about you know, whatare your strengths, what are
your talents.
That's an important set ofdecisions, and the fact that
you've moved that far so quicklyis really a great sign to me.
And so now just keep onthinking about those things.
But you know, we do have awriting with technology program
(36:32):
in the English department, don'twe?
Speaker 5 (36:34):
Yes, we do.
That's one of the minors underthe Literature and Languages
department.
So yeah, I can give you someinformation about that.
Speaker 2 (36:41):
And even if you end up being a full STEM guy, a
course like that could be veryuseful too.
There's a lot ofinterdisciplinary things that
are happening along the way.
So, now that you're eight weeksin, one of the things I had my
students do is a self-assessmentof how they thought they were
doing at the beginning, thefirst week, mary, and then in
the seventh week, which youturned in last week, do you
(37:01):
remember which ones you feellike you made the most progress
on?
And this is, by the way, 27skills?
I should get my list out andread them to you.
In fact, I'll give you a copyof it later on, dominic.
But yes, ma'am.
Speaker 4 (37:13):
I don't remember the specific topics that I said I
improved on, but I know for me,I think one of them I'm guessing
here but I think one of themwas like being connected with
the topics you're learning aboutand everything.
Yes, engagement, yes, and Ithink I've seen a big
improvement on myself on that,because in high school I would
(37:34):
just read the books or like I'dlearn about science and I would
just like try to memorizeeverything and make sure I got a
good grade on the test so Icould have good grades.
But now, with the comparingfactor and, like me, not knowing
what other people really aregetting on assignments, I think
I'm able to engage myself morewith the content that I'm like
supposed to be learning and Ilike being able to identify
(37:55):
author's purpose and everythinglike that, because I like that,
not because, oh, I know that'sgoing to be on the test.
So I think that was one of themajor improvements I had.
Speaker 2 (38:03):
But what that is, dominic, is.
I talk to my students a lot andI don't know if you've done
this too in his class, butmetacognition You've heard me
say that word before thinkingabout your thinking, which
usually in your high schoolyou're so busy getting your
grades done and getting yourhomework done and then you know
getting off to do whatever youhave to do after school that you
don't really think about whatyou're learning or how you're
(38:24):
learning.
And one of the best thingsstudents can do is, you know, I
always say take notes and studyyour notes, read your notes.
A lot of students will come toclass.
They don't take notes.
Do you take notes?
Speaker 3 (38:35):
Oh yeah, I take notes .
Speaker 2 (38:36):
Thank God.
I still have to say would youplease get your notes out?
And it's like I'm saying thatto a freshman in college.
I want to scream, but but youknow they have the bad habits
from high school.
What's the worst habit you havefrom high school that you want
to tell your high school friendsto knock off?
Speaker 3 (38:53):
I mean, my worst habit was probably not really
studying, mostly because, like Ididn't need to, you know I
could pass with a high enoughgrade.
But you know here, whenever Igot here, I was like wow, this
is a lot to learn in like whatfeels like a very short amount
of time.
So I'd start working onstudying, like as soon as
possible.
Speaker 2 (39:13):
Now, Mary, I'm not sure that would be the same bad
habit for you, but what would itbe for you?
Speaker 4 (39:24):
Definitely I would advise people not to be so
worried about being competitiveWhile I might have a different
perspective on that now incollege, because I'm not like in
medical school or I'm nottrying to be a lawyer, so grades
really aren't that importantMost of my motivation for
learning things came from oh, Ihave to be better than that
person, or oh, I have to makesure I have the highest GPA so I
can graduate this.
I definitely would advisepeople to leave that mindset as
soon as you walk across thatstage, because that's when your
(39:46):
education becomes more personalwhen you leave like if you're
doing better than other peoplebehind.
Speaker 2 (39:52):
Good attitude, although I will say Mary did get
into our Honors College and shewas valedictorian, so it had
some very proud moments to it.
But you can see that it justgets you past a certain point,
you know.
So now that you're going intothe eighth week, you've got only
six more weeks until thesemester's over.
(40:13):
How's that feel, mary?
Speaker 4 (40:15):
I feel like it feels more exciting because,
especially now, since I'm havingto go to academic advising
appointments, getting ready forregistration, I feel like I have
a better control this timearound, especially with, like,
looking into the next classesI'm going to take, rather than I
did in April of my senior year,when I really didn't know what
I was going to do, just tryingto get out of high school.
(40:36):
So it's more exciting, I think.
Speaker 2 (40:40):
Same thing for you, Dominic.
Speaker 3 (40:41):
Yeah, I mean it's pretty exciting to know like
almost a full semester throughthis, like it honestly caught me
by surprise.
But yeah, I am excited becauseyou know I'm getting advised at
a good time, unlike coming intothis semester.
I don't know if you remember,but I got advised fairly late.
Speaker 2 (40:58):
Yes, you did.
I remember you talked aboutthat, yeah.
Speaker 3 (41:01):
And so you know, just knowing what I want to do and
knowing that I'm going to havepretty good choices for classes,
you know it has me excited forit.
Speaker 2 (41:10):
You know, I think, if I recall, one of the things we
talked about last time was thatyou didn't really know how
important advising was.
You just kind of went, oh, I'mjust going to go to college, and
what you realize is thatthere's all these different
kinds of requirements, hoops youhave to hop through, there's a
lot of administrivia.
As we say that, as much as wehate it, it's part of the state
system and you've got to do it.
(41:30):
And so, knowing, oh, there's areason to do that and get to
your advising appointment earlyRemember, get to them early so
that the good classes won't befilled up you got to do that,
right?
What other kind of pieces ofadvice do you want to pass along
to the friends back in highschool?
Or maybe to that friend downthe hall who's not doing as well
(41:50):
in school as you are?
Speaker 3 (41:52):
Take advantage of the resources you have.
Take advantage of the free timeyou have, of the resources you
have.
Take advantage of the free timeyou have.
My biggest resource is havingthe library.
You know having a dedicatedspace to just go do work in.
You know whether you're like inthe open floor or if you need
like a private area, you knowyou can go into the personal
study rooms.
Take advantage of that.
(42:13):
I've had to use the writingcenter before and you know they
help with papers.
They help you get you on likethe track and kind of get your
ideas and understand what youneed.
They don't edit for you.
They helped me and my group.
We went and they helped us likeget our ideas on the right
track.
We were writing a paper it wasme and one of my group members
(42:35):
and we were trying to likefigure out how we want to get
our ideas together and how tostructure them and the person
there she was able to help usreally get it laid out, like how
she recommends to do it andstuff like that.
Speaker 2 (42:48):
What about librarians ?
Have you used librarians muchyet?
Speaker 3 (42:51):
I haven't.
Speaker 2 (42:52):
I think Mary has Want to tell them about librarians.
Speaker 4 (42:55):
Yeah.
So librarians are much morethan what you would ever expect
before you get to college.
They're the biggest brainiacson the whole entire planet.
I had to schedule anappointment with my specific
librarian because there'sdifferent librarians for each
major and everything like that.
So for my literature andlanguage librarian she was able
to sit me down and she showed methis.
So many like technological,like websites that can help
(43:19):
organize my sources, one beingSciWheel.
She showed me that that's likethe best thing I've ever seen in
my life.
You're able to like organizeall your big beefy academic
articles and everything likethat and organize it and write
notes and cite it, and it's thebest thing ever.
But meeting with her, she'sable to not only like sit there
and tell me like oh, look atthis article for this certain
(43:42):
paper, or whatever, she helpsyou like brainstorm.
Speaker 2 (43:46):
Why don't you tell folks what your project was, so
people can make it more concrete?
Speaker 4 (43:50):
My project was I had to create a PowerPoint for
background information into ourbook North and South, written by
Elizabeth Gaskell.
But my topic was family roles.
So I went up to her and I said,okay, I have this project about
family roles.
I need sources to cite, like Ikind of told her the main idea
of the project and she was ableto sit me down and say well, I
think you should structure itlike this and here are some good
(44:13):
sources and sites that you cango check out and read more about
the importance of the father inthe Victorian England time
period.
But yeah, they're like thesmartest people on the planet.
Speaker 2 (44:23):
They really are, and if you haven't used them yet,
Dominic, be aware that they'rethere and they are dying to help
you.
You know a lot of collegesdon't have research librarians
that are as wonderful as oursand a lot of professors don't
think to use them, but they'resitting there waiting, so be
sure you call on them.
Yeah, Vandy Dubry, she actuallyshe and I planned that project
together so that we know exactlyhow to direct you and we have
(44:47):
things like that, so you shouldbe really happy to know that
news.
Dominic.
Last little things, anythingelse you want to tell us?
I know that you were verynervous about coming here when I
first invited you and when Iasked you to come back, you said
you were happy to do it.
You want to tell us why?
Speaker 4 (45:03):
I feel like this is an opportunity for me to
validate my first year collegeexperience, because when
everyone asks about college,it's like oh, how are you doing?
The first instinct is to belike I'm doing good, no one
needs to help me, I'm literallyhaving the best time ever.
But in reality, a lot of peopleare struggling.
It's a normal thing to struggle.
So I feel like this being ableto talk with another first year
student and talking with mentorslike you guys it's so
(45:27):
validating to like see, it'sokay to struggle and it's okay
to experience this bigexperience for the first time in
your life.
Speaker 2 (45:36):
I about you, Dominic.
You didn't mind coming backeither, huh.
Speaker 3 (45:39):
No, I didn't.
I've been looking for ways toconnect with people on campus
and, you know, get to know themmore personally, and I think
this has been like a great wayto connect with another first
year, connect with my professor,connect with you, just be able
to connect with everybody, andit's been really nice.
Speaker 2 (46:01):
Yeah, and in fact that's one of the things that a
lot of times students strugglewith is connecting at first, you
know, especially when you'refar from home.
So we're going to probablyinvite you back to hear how
you're doing.
It may end up being a series.
We may just have to follow themall the way till graduation.
I don't know so well.
That was pretty interesting.
I enjoyed that.
I guess that's a wrap, ashley.
Speaker 6 (46:19):
Yes, ma'am, this has been the Ask Dr Ross podcast.
Thank you so much for listeningin with us today, and if you
have questions about collegelife or any of the topics that
we were talking about today,please send us your questions to
adrquestions at gmailcom.
We'd love to hear from you.
In the meanwhile, we'll see youin the next episode.
Thank you very much.
This is Ashley Wortley signingoff.
(46:41):
Bye-bye.
Popular Podcasts
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
The Breakfast Club
The World's Most Dangerous Morning Show, The Breakfast Club, With DJ Envy, Jess Hilarious, And Charlamagne Tha God!