A Moment of Happiness

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Try Again. Fail again. Fail Better.

Love the moment. Flowers grow out of dark moments. Therefore, each moment is vital. It affects the whole. Life is a succession of such moments and to live each, is to succeed.
-Corita Kent

The students of Hopkins Interactive constantly attempt to effectively show prospective students what it is actually like to be a Hopkins student. This usually means conversing about a social life, extracurricular activities, resources, advising, the city of Baltimore, research, majors, etc, but we don’t often talk about grading. Perhaps this is because grades are regarded as personal matters and the work that each student at Hopkins puts in to get a specific grade is unique to that student.

Despite this, and the initial reservations I had about discussing this topic, I’d like to discuss failure. And to qualify what I mean: the nature of the failure I am referring to is somewhere between what an excellent high school student will consider failure (i.e. a B-) and actual failure (i.e. a F). Most students that apply to and are accepted by Hopkins have a completely skewed scale of what is passing and failing which is encouraged by their position as among the brightest students in their respective high schools, and as such they are completely and utterly unprepared the first time they do not receive a near perfect mark for an exam/paper/etc.

This shock always befuddled me because you would assume coming to a school as rigorous as Hopkins with the reputation that it has, students would mentally prepare themselves to not do as well as they had done during high school. That would be the point. That this is college and not high school. There is supposed to be a drastic difference between the two. This is a place that is going to challenge you and that is what makes it so fantastic. Picking Hopkins as the college of choice is indicative of a passion for academics, intellectual curiosity and self-motivation, and with attributes such as these, it would be safe to assume that our students do not come in believing that a Hopkins education will be easy, in any definition of the word.

As a Hopkins student, you will get bad grades on exams and/or papers. And probably more than once.  And that, surprisingly enough, is okay. Failure is just as important in success in the experience that Hopkins, and college in general, offers. Failure is a part of life. If you aspire to be a surgeon, you will lose patients. If you want to become an engineer, some of your proposed projects will be denied. If you aspire to become a lawyer, you will lose cases. If art is your passion, there will be a time where a piece of art does not sell despite your best intention. If an  individual does not learn to deal with failure when it comes in the form of a D on a physics exam, them imagine the shock the first time they misdiagnose a patient or a jury decides against them.

Failure is an essential part of existence. The whole mantra of getting back on the horse is applicable in small and grandiose situations and it is a habit that must be learned early. College and academics is not only about learning material, it is, as trite as this may sound, learning how to be a competent human being. The title of this blog finds it origins in a Samuel Beckett quotations: "Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter. Try Again. Fail again. Fail better" and it is a thought that should be taken to heart. Failure is acceptable because it is a stepping stone. Learn how to fail now and learn from shortcomings because improvement is of utmost importance. Further, I think that a state of mind is exceedingly important when beginning your college career. The assumption that the four years will be filled with high and low points and a continuously altering circumstance is one that will be beneficial to taking advantage of everything this opportunity offers.

And at the end of the day, that is all we can ask for.

 

The pictures in these blogs represent some of the most beautiful failures: Michael Jordan who was cut from his high school basketball team for his "lack of skill;" Edgar Degas, a famous painter, held a sculpture show that was so poorly received by critics he never publicly showed his sculptures again and when he died 150 of them were found in his workshop and are now considered some of his best artist works; Albert Einstein whose grades were so poor that a teacher suggested he quit and told him, "Einstein, you'll never amount to anything!"

The JHU Tutorial Project

Student Organization Name: The JHU Tutorial Project

Category of Group: Community Service

Year Founded: 1958

Your Name: Wafa K

Your Year: Class of 2012

Your Position: Organizer 

Website: http://www.jhu.edu/csc/tutorialproject.shtml

One of the most meaningful and fulfilling activities that I participate in at Hopkins is the Johns Hopkins Tutorial Project. The Johns Hopkins Tutorial Project is an “after-school tutoring program for elementary school children in Baltimore City” and is one of the most inspiring activities I have been a part of ever, and that I get to witness twice a week. The Tutorial Project was founded in 1958, making it the longest-running program of its kind in Baltimore, and since its inception has served more than 5,000 kids. 

I choose to become involved in the Tutorial Project because it was one of the many things that initially attracted me to coming to Hopkins in the first place. Having an organization of this nature that runs for over fifty years requires dedication and passion that is synonymous with the Hopkins student population. Further, it is the founding block for the Center for Social Concern where many of the socially and community-minded organizations at Hopkins find their home. 

The Tutorial Project encompasses approximately 100 children that come to the Homewood campus twice a week either by bus or by their families, and each child has their own tutor.  The tutors, who are trained at the beginning of each semester, offer individual help in reading, math, science, geography etc. The tutors plan an hour of activities and educational games based on their unique child, based on assessments conducted at the beginning of the semester.

The people that conduct those assessments, and who are imperative to the smooth operation of the Tutorial Project, are organizers. Being an Organizer, which I am, requires one to be in charge of between four to six pairs of tutee-tutor, including training of the tutor, testing at the beginning and end of the semester of each tutee, and checking on the pairs every session, as well as dealing with making snack, riding the bus, special activities, behavior problems, monitoring play time at the end of every session, etc. 

In addition to the elementary school children, this past fall semester, the Tutorial Project also began its first semester of a sister program called LEAD, which is catered to middle school kids. Instead of traditional tutoring, these students are paired with a graduate student and spend the semester developing projects in areas of academia that are of interest to them. 

All Hopkins students are encouraged to become tutors. Nobody is turned away, because every additional Hopkins student we get to be a tutor means we get to say yes to another Baltimore family that wants their children in the program.

The Tutorial Project is so amazing because it epitomizes all the best things about Hopkins: encouraging academic pursuits, helping one another out, inspiring children, and giving back to the community in a touching and significant way. 

Many children in the program come from tough family situations and even tougher neighborhoods, and it is the height of their week coming to the Homewood campus to interact and learn with Hopkins students. Being a part of that experience, and seeing it constantly, is indescribable and something I plan to be a part of for the rest of my time at Hopkins.

O Canada!

No man needs a vacation so much as the person who has just had one. -Elbert Hubbard

When I said that I would spend my winter break forgetting about school and responsibilities, I really made good on that promise. My family and I, sans my father, have spent the last ten days in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. We were there visiting my aunt and her family, including my cousin’s two toddler boys aged two and three.

I basically spent a majority of my time pretending to be a horse, snarling like a tiger, and building pens for toy horses out of colored blocks. It was a perfect vacation. In addition to regularly mimicking animals, I got to hang out with my family without my Blackberry or regular internet access. Not that they don’t have internet in Montreal, they do. The problem is every time I sat down to use it a two or three year old, occasionally both, would demand to sit on my lap and also type on the keyboard. And so, now I am making up for the elapsed time and sending emails that need to be sent, and making plans for the upcoming month.

        

In Canada, I also got to experience Boxing Day, which is an experience of its own charm. Boxing Day is  the day after Christmas and is reminiscent of Black Friday, except it is definitely not Black Friday. My sisters and I, without our notion of insane shopping beginning at 4 am for door-buster deals with insane crowds and intense shoppers, were beyond amused when we pulled up at 8:30 am into Centre-ville and there was barely a soul in sight, then we soon found out that stores would not open until 1 in the afternoon. Despite this initial set-back and our massive head start, we got some good shopping done.

   

    

I absolutely adore any and all the time I spend in Montreal, most of my existences has been marked with visits year round to stay with my aunt and visit other family. The city has an old world charm of its own that is fantastic. I love the fact that I spent my break with family completely detached because something that’s all you need to recharge your batteries.

Happy New Year!

Let it snow.

Tread lightly, she is near
Under the snow,
Speak gently, she can hear
The daisies grow.
-Oscar Wilde

I love snow. It is one of my favorite things in the entire world. And so when the mid-Atlantic was pummeled with a blizzard this past weekend, I was beyond excited. That being said, I was a bit surprised when I stepped outside on Saturday and sunk knee-deep into twenty+ inches of snow.

 

   

In the DC metropolitan area, an inch of snow and the threat of ice is enough to get us a snow day off of school. This notion is laughable to the people I know from the Northeast and Midwest, but we were proud of our measly snow efforts. But this snowstorm, the Blizzard of ’09 as the local media has christened it, has done a lot to solidify our position as a place where the weather is as bipolar as the politicians who live here.

      

It was actually the largest one-day snow in over seventy-years. The last storm anywhere near this magnitude that I remember is in 1994 when my little sister was born. Some of the pictures the accompany this blog are of her when we ventured out on Saturday to play in the snow, fifteen years after (and a whole lot taller) the snow storm that my family associates with her.

 

Certain habits pop up when you are stuck inside with a snowstorm, my knitting that has sat idly in my closet since last winter was brought out. My mother told me she was tired of see the same scarf every winter, so I’m planning on finally finishing it this winter break.

A huge congratulations is in order for the newly admitted Hopkins Class of 2014. Welcome to Hopkins! I am excited to welcome you to the university you will call home for the next four years, the place and the people that you will identify with, to welcome you to the residence halls, the lecture halls and the gorgeous quads. At Hopkins, hopefully, you will become the adults you choose to be and the university will be there to help you every step of the way.

 

My apologies for lack of end-of-semester nostalgia in this blog, the end of the semester was a rough one for me and I intend to take advantage of winter break’s offer of forgetting about school for a bit.

Kind regards!

Photo cred to The Washington Post for pictures 1, 6 and 7

Stress Inducers and Busters.

Examinations are formidable even to the best prepared, for the greatest
fool may ask more than the wisest man can answer.
-Charles Caleb Colton

Finals season is something of a unique experience at Hopkins. Most of the Hopkins Interactive bloggers have or will talk about their own experiences, and this is my way of adding my two-cents. Finals have the ability to simultaneously pull out the most anxiety and procrastination of college students. With Reading Period, and a lack of classes to remind you what will happen if you don’t study – procrastination seems the most obvious and comfortable choice. But, the fact that essays are due at a rapidly increasing pace and the dates for finals seems to be unexplainable close can have a motivating effect. It is a balancing act – and one that nobody seems to do perfectly but we all do it well enough to not collapse/ give up on school all together.

 

But, it helps me to become overwhelmed not to think about the fact that I am taking my Calculus and Nervous System finals less than 20 hours apart, that I cannot even fathom doing enough research to finish my paper for Bodyworks, the number of emails I have to send to research labs in response to positions, and to even begin to speculate how many reaction mechanism problems I will have to do for  Organic Chemistry.

Instead of thinking of everything altogether, it becomes so much easier to tackle things one day at a time. I make a to-do list and if I accomplish what’s on that list, I’m golden – I don’t have to worry about the nine million things left for me to do. Plus I, like most students, have techniques that make everything seem better: Pandora Radio stations, Glee playlists on my iTunes, a bag of almonds (something about them helps me study), quick visits to Twitter and ONTD, and study breaks with my roommates and friends that remind us all that life does go on after finals, whether or not we remember that.

Instead of being overwhelmed, I’m thinking about how great winter break is going to be after this semester. I’m looking forward to the late mornings by the fireplace after a semester of waking up before sunrise, to Criminal Minds and History Channel marathons without a tinge of guilt at the work I should be doing, reading books that have been on hold for too long and baking until my family implores me to stop. I figure with all the stress that finals induce, it’s a calming effect to look at the end goal and boy, does it look good. 

All the best!
And best wishes to all the high school seniors who are waiting to hear back in the ED round!

Holidays and London.

"A good holiday is one spent among people whose notion of times if vaguer than yours."  -John B. Priestly

Thanksgiving break marks the first time most college students head home for the first time since they  leave for college in August. It becomes a finish line of sorts, making it to the third week of November equips someone with enough experience and stories to be a bonafide college student when they return home to visit. And I do love the five day break that the holiday entails, but I’ve always found it a bit cruel for that break to come before the last full week of classes, followed by reading period and a whole slew of final exams and assignments. It is basically a tease for what you have to work for to earn the elusive winter break that is a mere three weeks away.

My sister, abroad in London studying for her Masters at LSE, reminisced the other day to me over Thanksgiving commercials, preparation and the festivities that come along with it. Especially Black Friday, because as we all know, the shopping is a very close second to the food that comes along with Thanksgiving. This year, Eidd al-Adha, a religious holiday celebrated by Muslims all around the world marked by the annual Hajjfell on Black Friday so it was basically a senses-overwhelm of holiday festivities in my family. My sister was talking about how she had to go to school on Thanksgiving! The horror. There are no Presidential pardoning of a turkey or the Macy's Thanksigiving Day Parade. And there are no commercials advertising how early each store will open and the news programs don't report on how much money was made on Black Friday. The question I really have though, is what marks the beginning of the holiday season in United Kingdom? Is it after Halloween, or just some arbitrary understanding of the middle of November. And, when do college kids in England come home for the first time during their first semester - do they not come home until after finals or is there a compensatory fall break? So many questions, so little time. This is all I'm going to ask my sister when she comes home in mid-December.

Despite all this, I spent all day Saturday and Sunday studying for an upcoming exam and preparing for a class presentation on Body Integrity Identity Disorder. And, considering it is 11:00 on a Monday and I’m still awake (which is way past my usual bedtime – ask anyone who knows me) and reading Lecture Notes for Neuroscience makes me realize that cramming season has all but obliterated the Holiday season feeling. Well, except for the Jingle Bells station I’ve set up on Pandora radio – which makes practicing calculus problems so much more bearable.

All pictures courtesy of my mother's trip to London when she accompanied my sister to help her set up house at the beginning of their school year in late September.

Great Expectations

I learned three important things in college - to use a library, to memorize quickly
 and visually, to drop asleep at any time given a horizontal surface and fifteen minutes.
-Agnes DeMille

There is the common idiom that society has about the vast amounts of readings that a college student  is supposed to complete on a weekly basis. And it is very true; you see it all over the Hopkins campus, students sitting in Café Q or Levering, highlighters in hand, tackling a pile of readings that have accumulated.  And it is not just the humanities; the sciences and engineering almost always require reading in textbooks.

My classes this semester, see this blog for their description, almost all require weekly readings. Over all, college students read a couple hundred pages a week at the minimum. This, as a stark number, is one of the most daunting realities that you can tell a high school student because high school curriculum does not require this level of commitment.

But, let me take this opportunity to assure any high school student reading this, it is not that bad. Seriously.  You are not going to be reading four hundred pages per night: that is unreasonable (unless you leave all your reading until the day before your final, and by that point trying to read all of those pages might be a bit obsolete). The fact that classes are much shorter than in high school and meet less frequently means that professors require a bit more preparation and work outside of lecture. I happen to think this is a fair assumption.

But, as with any requirement, there are plenty of times where readings don’t get done. Sometimes we skim the biography instead of actually reading it for content, our orgo reading is reduced to glancing frantically at each successive page and insisting to your friends that you know exactly how a retrograde Diels-Alder reaction works, etc. These may or may not be examples from my own life. But, when the reading is not recommended, but required for class participation, not completing the readings end up being a bit more important.

This happened in one of my classes a few weeks ago when out of an entire class fifteen, one person had done the reading sufficiently enough to discuss it. And it took all of five minutes for our professor to figure this out, and promptly told us all to go home because there was no use for us there. And, to be completely honest, she was absolutely right. If our class only meets for an hour and fifteen minutes twice a week, there isn’t much time to make up for not doing the readings. It is not a great expectation to expect students to come to class prepared.

This was the first time I have had a professor send an entire class home, and I’m hoping not to repeat it anytime soon. So, I’m going to get on that reading now (or when I get home - the lesson still stands).

All the best!

Art Museum = Happiness.

“An ideal museum show would be a mating of Brideshead Revisited with House & Garden.

Provoking intense and pleasurable nostalgia for a past that none of its audience has had.”

-Robert Hughes

Considering Hopkins proximity to my home in Northern Virginia, I have always had the opportunity to go home whenever I am in the need of a little mother’s love, a home cooked meal or my laundry done (listed in their order of importance). The majority of students at Hopkins, however, don’t have this option including my two roommates. One is Lebanese but grew up on an American compound in Saudi Arabia, and her family still lives there. The other is from north Jersey, which, in regards to home cooked meals, might as well be Saudi Arabia. And so, this weekend, I brought both of them home so that they could revel in the comforts that only home life could provide ie cable television, a car and more food that you know what to do with.

In addition to Criminal Mind marathons and my bird deciding to be try for the record of being the loudest creature in existence, we also headed to the National Art Gallery to check out some of their new exhibitions. Considering the National Art Gallery is one of my favorite museums and I’ve taken school trips there since I was in first grade, I have accumulated more knowledge about particular pieces of art and various galleries than most people wish to listen to. In fact, my mother, who was with us, and who has heard me tell these stories a million and one times, proceeded to bolt in the opposite direction anytime I began. Awesome.

All in all, a successive trip plus loads of tourist-y pictures in front of the various important points in Washington DC near the Mall.

 

And now, back at Hopkins, I am engulfed in learning everything I can about synaptic transmission for neurotransmitters and ready an entire novel about the not-so-enthralling early life of Charles Darwin. The fact that we are essentially two weeks away from Thanksgiving only makes me question why time is rushing by so quickly.

All the best!

All pictures via my camera aka Mr. Darcy who earned that name because he's dark and moody meaning he occasionally completely refuses to work and other times works like a charm.

Eat, Drink and Be Scary.

Hold on, man.  We don't go anywhere with "scary," "spooky,"
"haunted," or "forbidden" in the title.  ~From Scooby-Doo

One of my favorite things about the last week of October is the Halloween party we throw for the kids  at the Tutorial Project. Last year I was a tutor, but this year I am an Organizer (which means I am in charge of five pairs of tutors and tutees and help the program run efficiently). But, obviously, one of the most important parts of being an Org is dressing up for the Halloween party.

The party, that is an annual tradition and is a collaboration with the Black Student Union and the Resident Advisory Board, has the kids in the Tutorial Project go trick-or-treating in freshmen housing and then go to the common room in AMR II where we have pizza, Halloween games, cartoons, books, arts and crafts, face painting and, a personal favorite, a haunted house run by the members of the BSU.

Our theme this year for the Organizers dressing up was Cowboys and Cowgirls: I realized as I was planning my outfit for Thursday that I had nearly nothing a Cowgirl would deem appropriate attire, and so I borrowed a plaid shirt from my roommate and boots from a friend. Further, our director, Young, had to go get us all Cowboys hats and those nifty horses on sticks that most people have as kids. I basically was in love with this stupid horse toy and one girl, one of five sisters four of which that are in our program, named him Charlie for me. She then proceeded to carry him the entire time they collected candy from freshmen in AMR II and promptly forgot about him when one of her sisters tried to steal some of her candy. Charlie Horse, as he is know known, who was involved in a long adventure of taking down decorations and bringing them back to Levering Hall, is currently resting very comfortable in the corner of my room.

The Haunted House that the BSU runs is usually a highlight during this party, a good percentage of the kids enjoy it because they either think it is hilarious and/or terrifying in a good way, and another percentage of the kids will not even consider going near it. I am not one of the kids of Tutorial, and I would still consider myself to be part of that latter percentage. The BSU does a REALLY good job of putting on this haunted house and I have a very low threshold for scary things and experiences. I'm in full agreement with the quotation from Scooby-Doo at this beginning of this blog. To put this in perspective, I should tell you the last scary movie I watched was Jeepers Creepers 1 when I was thirteen at 2 in the afternoon and I covered my eyes through a good three-fourths of the film. I have not watched a single scary film/ghost story show/paranormal anything since that day. At all. I realize and totally accept the craziness of this quality. But, I was not the only Org scarred at the perspective of going into the Haunted House. Janine, a fellow Org, and I decided to face our fears together and went in on literally the last tour and held hands the whole time, emerging a bit shocked and terrified. So mission kinda accomplished.

Classes, Professors and all that Jazz.

The purpose of primary education is the development of your weak characteristics;
the purpose of university education, the development of your strong. 
~Nevin Fenneman

In my last entry I promised the requisite blog entry about the classes that I am taking this semester.

This semester I am taking:

Organic Chemistry I: This class often has a reputation that precedes it, and most of the time it is  deserved.  That isn’t to say it is not enjoyable; the professor, Dr. Principe, is one of the clearest and most brilliant professor I have had. He also happens to be a Professor in the History of Science and Technology department, so I may have a bias. This class is more demanding that Orgo at other colleges because the answer to questions is not nearly as important as the logic and explanation behind it. In fact, Dr. Principe told us in class today that they don’t make books for Organic Chemistry students like us because apparently we’re not big enough of a market. I think this just means we have to study a whole lot more.

Calculus I for Biological and Medical Sciences: I really don’t know how to accurately describe how much I abhor math and anything to do with numbers. That being said, Dr. Brown, who is the Undergraduate Studies Director for the Math Department, is an incredible professor for those who are math-illiterate like me. He is incredibly helpful and willing to give extra help to make sure every student does his or her best. In a theme that is this semester, he also does not believe in just answering the question and so our exams are heavily based on the explanation of our calculations. I’m in this class with JHU_Saznin so that makes it a bit more bearable.

Exploration and Science: This class is a history class taught by Dr. Portuondo and is a class in the History of Science and Technology department. I don’t know why I did not expect it to be such a straight-laced history class when I signed up for it, but that is what it is. It is interesting and learning about the development of science is something that is very much within my realm, but I am realizing that I would rather be discussing the effects of naturphilosophe on Humboldt’s voyages than making sure my footnotes are exactly in line with the latest rules of historical writing.

Bodyworks: Body, Medicine and Technology in the 21st Century:
I absolutely adore this class; it meets once a week for two and a half hours and is taught by Dr. Wegenstein. In addition to being a linguist, she is also a filmmaker, which adds an extra dimension to the class. The material covered in this class discusses the interactions between being embodied and having a body and the many aspects of existence that influence the two.  We are reading articles, biographies, philosophical pieces, psychoanalysis, watching films and documentaries, etc. It is a class that combines the history of science, technology and medicine with psychology, philosophy, psychoanalysis and art.

Nervous System I: This is a required class for all Neuroscience majors, and to be perfectly honest, my favorite this semester. It is a reassuring feeling to take a class required for my major and actually enjoy the material and learning about the nervous system. I do not know what I would do if I did not enjoy a class all about what I want to study for the rest of my academic career. This class, taught by Dr. Hendry and Dr. Zhao, covers the basics of the Nervous System (duh) and gives us the basis of general knowledge, as well as the reasoning and qualifying abilities, to go onto higher level Neuroscience courses in more specific fields of study. The interesting thing about this class is the material is not at all about memorization or remembering names of proteins, but understanding the larger concepts as the most important factor of the nervous system. Our exams rarely ask us to spit back out a name of a enzyme or nuclei, but rather why it is important to the function that we have been studying. In that regard, it is much more challenging that initially expected but doing well is actually more rewarding.

Check out this video of an Outer Hair Cell dancing that we were shown during lecture:

That would be all the classes that I am taking this semester, and now back to practicing Orgo mechanisms  and trying to convince my immune system to actually function (the life of a pre-med is never dull).

All the best!