Boise State University Top Questions

I am amazed at how much I have changed throughout my college career. Although I will have taken an entire decade to complete my education I am proud of the progress I have made and the person I have become. I took time away from my studies to humanitarian aid work over in the Philippines. This pushed me beyond my comfort zone and gave me a new life perspective. I am not sorry that I took time off to have my three beautiful children or when I married my amazing husband. I worked setting up and staffing free maternity centers for the women of the Philippines. Each of these things shaped who I am and I am a better person because of these experiences. But I still knew that I wanted to complete my degree through the university. I am proud to be finally reaching the finish line. Thank you to everyone who helped and supported my along my path. I only hope that I have an opportunity to return the favor. Thank you for considering me for this scholarship.

Going to college is worth every penny and every hour spent working toward a degree. I watched how difficult it was for my mother to find decent work without an education. She finally went back to school and got a bachelor's degree in Social Sciences. It was amazing to see the transformation in her life. Now as a young adult myself, I found that I loved college! It is so much more rewarding and fun than high school. I even see a difference in my self-esteem, because once I accepted that challenge to go to college, I prove to myself everyday that I am intelligent and that being in school is where I should be right now. I can't imagine going back to worthless jobs where I felt I made terrible money and had no benefits. I know that when I obtain my degree, I will be ready to have a real job. What's more motivating than knowing you will only benefit from taking this chance? There are not many risks you can take in life that are as reliable and exciting, as getting to a college or university, and so valued.

Plan ahead. These two words should have come at a sooner time for me. College was something that I jumped into, sort of got pushed into doing, and I wish I would have planned better, given myself more time. Graduating early was something that I thought would help me greatly in life, but when time came around for high school graduation, I was not sure of my future. I would have loved to get an extra year to figure things out, much like other teenagers my age (17). Life would be easier, and I would be more prepared for what the future holds for me.

I would tell myself to look at all the aspects of a college before making my decision on where to go. I am a transfer to Boise State University. I chose my first Univeristy only on a Sport's basis and did not look at the academics or social experiences the school had to offer. Due to my misjudgement I had a horrible time my first year of college, but I was able to learn from my mistake. I chose to transfer to Boise State because of how much the school had to offer in every aspect of life. I would also tell the younger me to follow my passions in life and don't choose a major according to how much money I could make. When I first started taking college classis I only focused on what majors will make me rich. One of my favorite quotes by Mark Twain says, "The secret of success is making your vocation your vacation" and now I live by this motto. I am following my passions in life and now I get excited about school rather than it feeling like a chore.

Keep doing what I was doing, which is trying hard to get good grades.

The advice that I would give myself is to work as hard as I could to get really good grades. I had a very hard time in high school because I had to change schools about every two or three years of my life. It was really hard to make a lot of close friends, becasue as soon as I would start feeling close to people I would have to move again. Therefore, I would tell myself to hang in there and keep my head held high, we will get through this hard time. I would also say to keep trying as hard as I could when it came to life, and I will succeed at whatever I put my heart and mind into.

I would give myself the advice to not go into college with too many expecatations. Begining college as a freshman I had a lot of expectations that college was going to be so much fun, just like the movies that I had seen. However, I found that, at first, it was hard to adjust to so many changes. I had a hard time with the fact that college was so different than high school and that I didn't see my same set of friends every day. having so many expectations that college was going to be a certain way made the transition harder. Once I learned that I had to go with the flow, my college experience became a lot more enjoyable. Now I love the school I attend because I made it my own.

Unless you are hell-bent on making it into an Ivy League university, be flexible in your options for college. You need to be flexible, both in your college options and your behavior your first year. Don't assume that you will get accepted to your dream school. I only applied to my first-choice school and two backup schools, and when I was waitlisted at my first choice, my self-esteem was utterly destroyed. My low self-esteem carried into my first year, which affected my relationships with other people, my study habits, and my enjoyment of college activities. Poor first-year experiences compounded into lackluster second- and third-year experiences. Because of my lack of flexibility during my senior year of high school, I ended up at a school I might otherwise have enjoyed with shattered self-esteem and an overall poor undergraduate experience. I've tried very hard to improve upon my first year, but it's been hard to undo the damage. If only I had been willing to look outside the box that I had placed myself in my senior year, things might have ended up differently.

I would focus more on taking a heavier load of core classes earlier. I would also pay better attention to which professors I was deciding to take since it can make a big difference.

If I was to go back and talk to myself as a high school senior I would tell myself to look more closely into what college I really want to attend first. Choose a school that you feel would be best for yourself and not for the person you are with. It hurts more to know that your at a school with out the person you decided to go there for. So to avoid the part where I transfered to a new school I would tell myself to go with the best school and the rest will fall into place.