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Cassandra C. Sanchez Professor Vana E114a 12, September 2013

Ready or Not Do well in school so you can do better in college, my mom always said to me. My family has raised me to believe that high school was a mere stepping stone to college, that it was just our starting point in education while college was a completely different and challenging level. They said college is all about you and your dedication to your education so I would have to be very studious and be dedicated to my grades if I wanted a good future. And Im pretty sure Im not alone when I say that most parents have made college sound way too serious and a lot more intimidating than what it should be. I am currently a freshman in CSU, Northridge. To be precise, I have been a CSUN student for 3 weeks 3 days and 10 hours as of right now. From this you can see, I barely started my college life and yet I find it crazy to see so many differences and similarities in comparison to my high school, Eagle Rock. It wasnt until my junior year of high school that a chain reaction started; everyone knew this was the make it or break it year if we wanted to go to a good college. In high school I heard about a ton of clubs, activities and AP classes that were supposed to prepare me for college. Since I didnt want to be the left behind on my journey to college, I tried some of these organizations. For me Ive always been a clubs, activity person so I joined numerous leadership groups which are actually a lot similar to the leadership groups here. Northridge even has the

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continuation of my high school Key Club but for college students called Circle K. But other than clubs I joined at least 2-3 AP classes in high school to prepare me for college or to at least get ahead in college credits. I took AP US History, AP Psychology, and AP Studio Art. I may not have got the credit I wanted from these classes for college but I did learn from these classes that gave me a bit of an advantage for some of my college classes. Hoping to do some sort of successful career in the arts, I am an Art Major with 2 art classes so far. From my high school AP Studio art I learned most of the technics I needed to learn and perform in my 2 art classes this year. Within these past 2 weeks Ive already had 2-3 projects that involved the skills and techniques that I already developed from my high school course. So I can proudly say high school actually prepared me for college! Moreover, I can say the same for my math and English classes here in Northridge. I did increase my knowledge for these classes in high school because these are never ending topics that get more and more into depth each year. So far, I havent gone too much out of my comfort zone in my studies that I am not familiar with from high school. Freshman year has been mainly the basics so far. In my math I am reviewing and using the basic math I learned in high school just with a little more advance steps along the way. And for English its the same thing, I was taught to properly write and express my ideas onto paper in a well-mannered and educated way using MLA, citing sources and correct grammar tenses. I am really lucky to have done decent enough in high school so I wasnt completely lost when going to college. Though I dont currently have a science class in college, I think the best advice and skill I gained from high school was from my sophomore biology the teacher Mr. Lord. Even though I wasnt that interested in this subject and in addition I wasnt good at that subject, I still believe I gained the most important experiences to help me be ready for college in this class in comparison

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to all of my other classes. My. Lord was the only teacher to actually enforce the students to make and create our future idea career and our plan to reach our goal. This project really challenged me and got me to realize that in order to do successful in college, I needed to start with a plan. He also gave me the confidence to pursue my dream of working in the Arts for a career because he said, Life is what you make it and if you set your mind to it, nothings impossible. That quote really stuck to me and led me to where I am today, an art major trying to do her best in college whether the road may be risky or tough, and I am determined to reach my destination. In addition, my teacher treated everyone like we were college students. He let us have full control of how we learned and just guided us to what we needed but we literally had to self-teach ourselves the lessons. He was also the first teacher to teach me the ways of cornel notes which were life savers because it was incredibly handy for quick well detailed notes for my college classes. Furthermore, this class taught me to manage an organize my time onto a schedule of how much time I should put into fun school, relaxation and other things I was dedicated too. And finally this class has made me have to keep up with all the readings, tests, projects and homework on my own which made me is able to adapt to this fast paced college. If I never had this class, college would have been the hardest most challenging transition I ever had to make in my entire life. The only thing I really regret and wish I could have fixed to prepare myself better for college was my mind set. I wish I started off high school with a more focused and determined. For example, when Amy Tan wrote in her article Mother Tongue that I happen to be rebellious in nature and enjoy the challenge of disproving assumptions made about me, (Tan 4) that made me wish I was more like that earlier when it came to my studies. Amy Tans fighting spirit is what I wish I had in high school and it is the spirit I wish to gain in my college experiences.

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If I made a plan for my career and my college sooner I feel like I would have been not only a better, more refined student but I feel I would have had better grades and I would have been more confident in my studies. My mind set made me the low self-esteem and shy student I am today. If only I started high school with my head held high and focused more I could have been confidently walking down these college halls while being the top of my class instead of always settling for average. Overall I have many regrets and things that I am grateful for from my high school that either helped me or stressed me about my transition to college. But never the less, I am still a young student just trying to find my way and through my experiences I am trying to do my best. And ready or not, here I am college.