My first year being a part of RACA Staff as a Resident Assistant was full of growth. I struggled balance between being an RA, academics, and having a personal life. I was put in situations I had been trained for, but which I never could have imagined dealing with. I was fearful of making the wrong decision or not acting at all. The emotional toll was greater than I ever could have prepared for. But the experiences that year helped better prepare me for many of the things I will likely encounter in the classroom. I learned how to have hard conversations, deal with conflict, communicate with a variety of others in an effective way. I gained my own voice and a greater sense of my own abilities. I got to be a part of something greater than me and that resulted in a greater version of me.
Poetry
I took a poetry course in the fall semester of my sophomore year simply because I thought it would be fun. It is the only course at Drury that I had which did not meet any requirement. I have loved writing for as long as I can remember and feel I can express my truest self through writing. I desired to take this course because I wanted to grow. I learned so much about poetry and writing poetry in this course. I was even able to write poems that were published in Drury's literary magazine Currents. This love of learning, the desire to grow your knowledge in the areas that you are passionate, is what I desire to instill in my future students.
Sculpture
At Drury, we are required to take fine art class. I am not a naturally artistic person. I can be creative or crafty, but not artistic in the sense of painting or drawing. I had taken a pottery class in high school that resulted in a lot of lopsided bowls. But I had managed and passed and had some fun. So I decided to take a sculpture course to satisfy my requirement. This class was a welding class. When I realized this on the first day, I was scared. I was honestly afraid of fire and the only tool I had ever used was a screwdriver. But our professor asked us to trust the process. So I did. By the end of the course, I had designed, created, and welded five original pieces. There were many daunting moments and some broken drill bits, but I did it. And I made some friends along the way. What I learned from this course was that if we don't get outside of our comfort zone, we will never truly grow, and that, we must trust the process.