This is it! My final weekly blog. Thinking about everything that has happened in the past week I feel very nostalgic on my entire year in ISM 2. Through all of the AP testing me and my fellow classmates have been suffering together in hopes of receiving some more college credit, I have had a nice, easy slow down in my independent study class, since really all that is left is preparing for final presentation night. I am excited and nervous for what is to come, since most of my friends are in ISM already so we will see how many people can actually come and hear my presentation! Other than that, graduation is coming up way faster than I anticipated. Everyone always says it comes fast, but it is hard to truly understand until you are going through it! I am really excited for all the senior events that will litter these last couple of weeks of high school with fun and recognition for all of my hard work the past four years. I am so ready for Austin next year, to meet new people, and to put myself out there in hopes of making a change. ISM has helped me do so many things, and I will take all the lessons I have learned with me throughout my career! Thank you Coach Goff!
This past week I turned in my final product and it felt so good! I am so proud of everything I have learned, worked toward, and accomplished this semester. I have experienced many trails and tribulations as senioritis continues to strike me and my classmates with stronger force, but I slowly but surely making it through. I emailed my presentation to Mr. Classe and I look forward to hearing from him after he has reviewed it. Another high point of last week was that I finally turned 18 so I am officially an adult! Truly, I have grown up in the ISM program and am grateful for everything it has done for me. Now that I have practiced my final presentation night speech I feel ready for the night to arrive, and am very excited to share all of my research with my family and friends on a topic I am so passionate about. I get more and more excited thinking about the future because I know it is going to be great, I can feel it! As ISM winds down and my AP exams continue after this morning's kick off, I look forward to the rest of the year and my last experiences in high school.
This past week I finished my final product, and I have never felt so proud of something I have achieved. As I finished my last article and the run through of editing I felt a crash of nostalgia for all the hours I have spent creating the pieces that culminated into the finished project. The part I am most proud of, however, is the presentation I made for Mr. Classe and the rest of the school board. I poured hours of blood, sweat, and tears into creating it and I could almost regard it as my child at this point. I am nervous and excited to hear what he has to say. Ultimately, while I have had to battle a lot of procrastination and senioritis, I definitely managed my time better this year than last year and I feel a lot less stress coming into the final month of my high school experience. I cannot wait for Karen to look over all of my creations and am especially looking forward to presenting my powerpoint on sustainability initiatives for the district! At this point, I am almost more excited about my add-on project than my actual product, though the two could individually be regarded as final products! More to come on the preparations for final presentation night, I am making a note to really practice my speech for the very last go-around!
This past week I essentially completed my final product! Having reached the point where I am almost finished is quite remarkable since I remember exactly where I started and how I planned originally for everything to go, versus how drastically everything has changed up to this moment. I am very glad I chose to write three articles however, since I definitely would not have been able to write seven quality articles. My eclectic experience of journalism and communications as a whole has definitely taught me what I like versus what I prefer to avoid in terms of writing style and article type, so it has been helpful in my search of which specific career within the broad fields I wish to pursue later on. Karen has been very helpful through my entire creation, and without her, none of the amazing things I had the opportunity to do with each article would have happened. As graduation inches closer I am realizing that I will soon be a real professional out in the world rather than a blossoming one, and I am very grateful to know that I will be prepared for any trials and tribulations I will inevitably have to face as an adult thanks to the ISM program.
This past week I had the opportunity to talk to mayor Cheney on a call and Mr. John Classe, the FISD school board president, in person! Not only that, but I was also selected as a finalist for a scholarship and got to meet with the people who run and fund the scholarship during an interview! This has definitely been one of my more eventful weeks, both in and out of my independent study. I am almost finished with my final product, and it is hard for me to believe that it is almost the end of my second year in ISM. Final presentation night is just around the corner, and I could not be more excited! I have begun to comprise my final speech and am slowly putting everything together the way I think is perfect. Along with that, I have finished brainstorming my third article and am going to start writing it this week as I finalize my investigative piece on renewable energy in the state of Texas and city of Frisco. It really helped getting to learn from both Mr. Classe and Mr. Cheney. I will be following up with Mr. Classe this week by emailing him some of my research and ideas to hopefully spark something newly sustainable in Frisco ISD. I am looking forward to the response!
This past week I have had the opportunity to meet with two amazing men! On Monday I had the pleasure of speaking to Frisco mayor Jeff Cheney about sustainability initiatives in and planned for the city of Frisco. He gave me great insight on many things I previously did not know as well as things I was familiar with already, such as the zero energy waste neighborhood with grass roofs that is coming to the city in coming years! I learned about the Star and other large facilities and how they are environmentally friendly as well. Today I had the pleasure of meeting with school board president John Classe, which I will go into depth further in the next blog! Other than the fantastic primary research I have done for my final product through these interviews, I also met with Karen and we discussed the future of our mentorship as well as college and what the future holds for her at the Chamber. Having someone to help give me advice on my articles, cheer me on and provide insight on the future has really helped my progress this year, and I can feel myself moving to even greater heights! My second article will be finished very soon, and I will begin my final one! I am excited to finish my final product, and present it to my family.
This past week has been fairly uneventful. I have been patiently waiting for the city council members to respond to my email about implementing a sustainability initiative in the city of Frisco. Other than that, I have taken a break from my final product to brainstorm some more ideas since I am way ahead of schedule. I am meeting with Karen this Thursday to talk through some things, since she always gives me the best guidance! I am hoping to be able to write more articles for the Chamber, whether it be about a small business or something big that is coming or that should be coming. I am open to anything! I just feel like writing with a purpose will inspire me. Plus, I feel like I am apt to handling the task. Graduation is in less than two months, and I can see the end of high school is very near. A fantastic thing that I am proud to say, however, is that my relationship with Karen will not and I hope to work with her this summer. I am so excited that as soon as high school ends I get to officially start pursuing what I have unofficially been striving towards already. I am ready to write more and hopefully make a difference with my work!
This last week has inspired me to take action in my community in an attempt to make a difference. As a journalist, my dream is to impact others throughout my research and writing. Throughout the continual completion of my final product, I have been doing investigative journalism on sustainability in the state of Texas and how to implement renewable initiatives into the city of Frisco. After conferring with Karen at a mentor visit, she encouraged me to send an email to some city council members with my ideas and questions and I have, inspiring me further to take action to help protect the environment. Starting local is my goal, but I hope to dedicate my professional career to advocating for the environment whether that be through legislation or articles that appeal to the public. Ultimately, I feel that the continual effort and thought that I put into my final product has greatly influenced me to shift my direction into something I never fathomed, but I am grateful that this has all happened! I am excited that I am exploring different styles of journalism and am continuing to enhance my passion for writing. Having the opportunity to apply what I am doing to the real world makes me feel even more prepared to go off on my own next year!
Over the last two weeks, I have had the opportunity to crack down on my final product, and begin a piece that I am incredibly excited about. My main goal as a journalist would be to research and expose the methods that we as a planet can implement more sustainable technologies to not only help the economy but also ensure a decent future for later generations, and after doing a lot of research and thinking, I decided to write about how to make Frisco as a city more sustainable. I feel like it becomes harder to write the more I care about a piece because the perfectionist in me comes out and takes over. Although, my greatest challenge, especially over spring break, would have to be the procrastinating and lack of time management. I kept saying to myself I had all the time in the world and then suddenly realized I had a few days left to research and write. Regardless of senioritis beginning to swallow me whole, my greatest accomplishment would have to be my website, since I am really proud of the way it is turning out. I am excited to see Karen tomorrow and discuss where I can go with my article, and what direction I can take with the rest of them!
This past week has been up to par with the previous! On my mentor visit, Karen published my article about ISM on the Chamber of Commerce website! I even made it on the home page, which felt pretty amazing. Not only did it get shared on LinkedIn, but also the few hundred subscribers that the Chamber blog has! Even though my greatest adversity faced involved getting rejected from the honors program at UT and eating a pint of ice cream to compensate, I feel like the winning streak in my writing career so far makes up for the inevitable rejections I am bound to only continue to face. I am continuing to work on my final product, as well as consider the upcoming final presentation night. It is hard to believe it is so close already, but designing my invitation this week is something In am looking forward to and I cannot wait to talk about it more with Karen. I plan on using my spring break wisely and finishing my fourth article at least so that I can really focus on making my final product the best it can be. When it comes time to, I want to present my heart and soul to the classroom of family that comes to support me in May and I plan on making that happen through the work I put into my writing!
|
|