Tuesday, October 14, 2008

Diversity

Diversity is a sensitive issue since there are still hints of racism today. At ASU, you can clearly see the different ethnic backgrounds in our area and its good to see people of all race and color together for a single purpose which is to be educated. If your willing to accept others for who they are and not judge them by their color then it will help you in the future because at one time or another you will be forced to work with a person of a different race then you are.

Delia Saenz says students at ASU come from all 50 states and 141 nations throughout the world. It's really amazing to think the amount of people from all over the world who come together for a single goal, and when you have such a large pool of people with differences it's a good idea to interact with them to learn about their culture and beliefs instead of hating them because they are different. Openness is a positive way to view someone because it enhances understanding and contributes to forward movement. If we weren't open to others and their ideas then we will never be able to move forward and progress for new innovations and understanding. Sex is also part of diversity and not just race, women are just as important as men in our society so to discriminate them is to take a step backwards.

President Crow has conveyed that we must find ways to reach into all our communities with warmth and openness because in doing so everyone benefits and is happy as a result.

Global engagement

We must remember we are not the only important country in this world and global engagement is extremely crucial to the success of not only America but the world. Being an American we should know whats happening around the world more then we do right now, we sometimes get that idea that everything revolves around us.

As Bud Rock who is the Vice-President for Global Engagement at ASU says "It’s important to realize that that someplace else, that larger world is part of the world in which you live." This is very true because everything we deal with today somehow relates to another nation, such as gas with is from the Middle East, most of our consumer products come from China, and our troops are fighting wars in the Middle East as well. The more aware we are of the world we can do something to help it such as donating money or food to help homeless people in disasters or third world countries. Living in the United States we are a mixture of people from every country in the world and we are very diverse so it's also a good idea to learn other languages such as Spanish or Chinese. The "Global Engagement" Introduction suggest that we get a passport and be ready to travel, whether for pleasure or for your academic pursuits and attend the Study Abroad 101 course. Being engage is not only good for everyone around us but also for yourself since you can feel good that you made a difference in the world.

Entrepreneurship

Entrepreneurship has many meaning to people in this world, one could be starting a business to help your community or the other is to make as much money as possible. According to Dan O’Neill ASU defines it as the spirit of creative risk taking. To me it's someone or a group of people who are willing to go the extra mile and to think outside the box to be able to build a business or organization that does a service for the outside community.

The people who go into this world and is successful is one who is very smart, not afraid of failure, bold, and resourceful. People such as Bill Gates are perfect examples of entrepreneurship done the right way, they don't wait for the right job to come to them they go out and make it come to them. Without them, we wouldn't have businesses and products that we use everyday such as computers, Ipods, or phones. For someone who wants to start their own business and take risks, they should have ambitions and be willing to tough it out. For students, ASU provides many opportunities to achieve their goals of entrepreneurship by the Edson Student Entrepreneur Initiative. With the skills they learn in this class and throughout college, one has a good chance in being successful as long as they have the will.

Green Living: Sustainability

Sustainability is a word that is vital to our world, some people might automatically think of it as something that isn't real or not something that we need to deal with right now. However, this is far from the truth because there is scientific evidence supporting the idea that humans are contributing to global warming and our resources on earth are finite so at the rate we our using them, eventually there will be none left for future generations.

Chuck Redman informs us that our resources are finite and that the ability of earth to replenish the resources is not keeping up with the rate of us using them. Also, our ability to work with other nations is very important because the effort to save our world is a worldwide one and us by ourselves is not enough. There are many challenges facing us today such as limited food supplies, water, pollution, global warming, and oil and natural gases, these all come together to work against us. One thing we can do is trade offs, balance the amount we need and use in order to slow down our usage as well as helping countries who are not developed yet. According to Redman one problem is the inequality in wealth and power, because the rich have more money then they need and the try to help them self and not others, the same goes for 1st world nations who don't aide 3rd world countries.

If we are willing and able to change our planet for the better then we must work together, put aside our differences and find a solution for solve the issues today because if we don't the consequences could be far worse then the cost of fixing it today.

Succeeding at ASU

Succeeding at ASU or anywhere for that matter is the one goal that everyone no matter their background or viewpoints wants to do. Success is no easy task, but if one is willing to work hard, not take shortcuts, show up to class everyday and ask questions then anyone has the ability to do well in school and eventually in life.

As Afsaneh Nahavandi mentions the transition from high school to college may effect someones mindset and throw them off course. As high school is very structured and everything has a specific due date and time schedule college does not. Some people might take off and ditch a class since they don't care, however, this along with limited instructions on how to do something can cause a new student to be confused and lost. So to counter this, a Freshman needs to set a schedule of when and what to do as well as not to work and be over worked. Stress is another factor that can hurt us so what one can do is play sports or do extra curricular activities that can help and it's good for your body too. One last tip is to visit and talk to your teacher, going to class and learning only 3 days a week and doing most of your learning by reading can be hard to understand. They are there to help you so visit them during their office hours so you can get your specific questions answered.

All of these tips will hopefully help you do well in school and the knowledge you get during you college years will carry on after to your future jobs, since work and school are not that far apart when it comes to asking questions, learning the process, and setting time schedules.

Academic Integrity

Academic Integrity is one of the most important part of life at ASU for many reasons. One is that it keeps you from using other people's ideas or work as you own, thus, making you do your own work and not taking short cuts which in life can lead to bad habits. The other reason is that you learn to be responsible and moral because when you cheat your doing harm to yourself both by hurting others and if your caught by your instructor then you can loose points or even fail the class.

As Leslie Shell stats in the presentation "Make sure you know all of the policies and expectations of the instructor teaching the class and of the department offering the course" this is important because sometimes the teacher may allow you to use your own paper from another class or in the past for the current assignment which other wise would be considered dishonesty. Also, the XE designation may appears on your official transcript with a notation, "Failure due to academic dishonesty." A XE would keep you from participating in extracurricular activities like student clubs and sports teams and when you apply for a job and they see that it may effect that as well, so we can see how cheating can affect you for a very long time negatively.

Students should take the extra few minutes it takes to do their own work rather then copying someone elses or looking over at a person's test to see a few answers because those little things you think won't hurt you may very well come back to hurt you even more in the long term.

Saturday, September 6, 2008

Hello

I'am Phil and I love long walks on the beaches lol jk. I am majoring in accounting and I am a freshman. I have 2 dogs both are German Shephards and I have one older brother who just got married. This is my first time blogging so I dont have much else to say.