Mentoring

                                                 Regurgitating Thoughts 

                                                  Real Thoughts from your Average Chick

                                                      By UMES Senior Jordan Hamilton

                                                   

Mentoring

Growing up I always wished I had the opportunity to have someone older than me who I could look up to outside of family. Aside from teachers, I never really had that support system growing up who could help shape me into the young woman I would grow up to be. As I got older, I decided that since I was never granted that opportunity when I was younger, I would be that support system once I matured. It wasn’t until Spring 2012 when I finally got the opportunity to be a mentor. Yes, I was a mentor and it was the best decision I had ever made. I had no clue that UMES students were mentors to local elementary school students. It was finally my turn to make a difference and that was exactly what I did. Mrs. Hood, a representative at Greenwood Elementary said the following about the mentoring program, “The UMES student mentoring program is an integral part of our students' academic success and social well-being. The students at Greenwood Elementary School enjoy the individualized attention and interest provided to them from their mentors. The staff greatly appreciates the time and effort that has been given to our students and looks forward to continuing this invaluable partnership.” Myself and several other students from the university would take time out of our busy schedule to be a big brother or big sister to those who needed it most. Most of these children were going through a lot within their homes and they needed someone to steer them on the right path. Mentors had between one and three mentees at a time. Regular meetings with mentees consisted of working on homework, sitting in on classroom discussions, making sure everything was going on the right track and group activities on weekends. Keeping your word and showing up to meet with your mentees is one of the most important things to remember when it comes to being a men tor. I learned while mentoring that these children grow to look up to you and when you tell them something, they don’t forget it. I had the opportunity of speaking with the former principal of Princess Anne Elementary School, Mrs. Johnson and finding out her perspective on the mentoring program she said, “I was thrilled to have an opportunity to provide my students with great role models, additional help with academics, and someone that they could talk to. All of these were benefits that my students acquired through the mentoring collaboration with UMES. The mentors went above and beyond their responsibilities as a mentor to help my students. In a society where there are many negative forces impacting our children's daily lives, this mentoring program was a positive ray of hope for my students. “Becoming a mentor allowed me to better myself while helping better someone else. There are so many children, but not enough mentors out there. If you are interested in making a difference in someone’s life and mentoring at either Princess Anne Elementary School or Greenwood Elementary school, contact Dr. Wright in the History department at jkwright1492@yahoo.com.

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I Want To See Other People

                                                        An Elective on Perspective

                                                       by UMES Junior Brittany Johnson

                                                              

I Want To See Other People

Am I the only person who doesn’t trust herself? I’ve suppressed the little voice inside of my head that’s filled with respectable suggestions so long that I can hardly identify it. I’m suspicious of myself. I don’t know if I’m giving myself sound advice, or trying to set myself up. I talk myself into bad ideas and talk myself out of good ones. On numerous occasions I have acted as my own adversary. But, how do I fix it? I can’t tell myself that I would like to see other people. I can’t divorce myself. I’m stuck with the monster I created.

You know the popular saying, “I told God to protect me from my enemies, and then I started losing friends”? Well, I asked God to protect me from my enemies, and I started gaining awareness of self. Am I evil? Am I horrible? Of course not. Am I the person I should be right now? Of course not! Sometimes you have to step back and take a long hard look at yourself. During said look you should ask yourself if you’re the person you would want to meet; or would you be the person that you see from afar off and pray to baby, teenage, and adult Jesus that they don’t see you. You have to take yourself seriously in order to be taken seriously. If there’s something that you see yourself as lacking, it’s your job to fix it.

Life is like a box of chocolates? I think not. I’ve gotten some disgusting chocolates, but I still ended up eating them. Maybe that’s just me being a fat girl; but either way, they were still somewhat enjoyable. Life, however, is the total opposite. At this point in life I’d say life is more like a treadmill that you can’t turn off. It’s just you and it. If you keep the pace, you aren’t growing. If you get comfortable with what you’ve done thus far and stop, you start moving backwards. If you gather the courage and tap into your energy reserve to increase the pace, you almost kill yourself trying to keep up. What is my point? Kill yourself trying to keep up. That way you’ve thought yourself special enough to die for. That’s the greatest love story that’s never been told.

You’ve just taken, An Elective on Perspective

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Put a Sock in it! Stop Complaining!

Put a Sock in it! Stop Complaining!

By UMES senior Kyla Bibbins

Sometimes I get so tired of people complaining. Now we all are guilty of an occasional sigh of irritability from time to time and that’s fine. But I need everyone complaining constantly over, any and everything to just PUT A SOCK IN IT! Not only does it show you’re unappreciative, it brings negativity to the world around you and its annoying!

Have you ever been having a great day, and then someone just comes up to you and complains to you  about everything that’s going wrong in their life and I mean everything from their nail just broke to their failing grade that the teacher supposedly gave them.  That feeling you get as a result of them complaining to you, you know the feeling that makes you feel a little annoyed and irritated, that’s called negativity! Oh and negativity is one of the most contagious diseases on the face of the earth, so when you sense it … Run! Negativity is spread as a result of your complaints so please think twice before telling someone how your internet is temporarily down in your residential hall and how this is making your life miserable, even though you can  use the internet in Waters or the library, until your internet is back up and working.

Now like I said, we all are guilty of expressing our sighs of frustration but please be mindful of what you are complaining of.  For example if you are a college student with no job why are you complaining that you don’t have money to go shopping? Stop complaining and get a job! Or here is another scenario, let’s say you have a class at 8 a.m. every morning and you’re not a morning person, instead of complaining that you have to get up at 8 a.m. how about you appreciate the fact that you woke up this morning, because, somebody didn’t have that opportunity. And please, please, please, stop complaining about food in the Café. I mean come on; they serve us lobster, shrimp, steak and crab legs multiple times throughout the semester. Of course they don’t serve it every day, but everyday there is something good to eat.  Just be thankful they don’t serve us Sloppy Joes and Hot Dog’s every day, because I have been to the café at other Universities and they make our Plateau look like a 5 star restaurant.

I hope I don’t sound too insensitive, because I do understand what it feels like to have a day where things aren’t working in your favor. But I am sick of hearing people complain about frivolous things! The fact that you spilled some juice on your shirt at lunch is not as important as the test that you have after lunch, so before you complain- PUT A SOCK IN IT!

Be Thankful,

Kyla Bibbins

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What's Next?

 

What's Next?

By UMES senior Kyla Bibbins

There are less than 70 days left until I will be another proud UMES graduate!  Lately the reality that this is my last semester as an undergraduate has been haunting me, I just keep thinking “What is next!?” Of course this question is one that I have been pondering for so many months now. But it is so difficult to make a decision when you have so many options.

 I feel like this is one of the most important points in my life and the choices that I make now will affect my future drastically. Maybe this is why I am so torn between deciding what path to choose after Undergrad, should I take the graduate school route, or take the career trail? I have filled out applications for both, but I still am not certain on my next big move.

I have received advice from many professionals about the matter, and all of them seem to, in their own way of course, tell me to make my choice based on what I find interesting. I wish I could just make my decision based on flipping a coin, that would be much easier. The only thing I have decided is to not stress about making my decision, I have a feeling that everything will turn out okay.

 

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Know Your Worth

Know Your Worth

By UMES Senior Kyla Bibbins

Headlining this year’s Homecoming concert was Hip-hop recording artist 2Chainz and Juicy J. I must say that the concert was very entertaining. Before the 2Chainz incident that led to his late arrival to the concert hip-hop artist Juicy J performed a few of his songs. Personally I am not a huge fan of Juicy J, but I do enjoy his music from time to time.

 Before I make my point, I want to make it clear that I thought his performance was very energetic and it was not bad at all! But during his performance he made a comment that made me look twice.  While on stage Juicy he made a verbal request for all of the (we’ll just say female dog’s) to come to the stage to dance. In the Hip-Hop world this phrase is not new so I don’t know why I even thought twice about what he said, but for whatever reason his remark didn’t sit well with me on this particular occasion.  I’m not sure why, maybe it was the sight of watching my peers bombard the stage to shake something for Juicy that made me uneasy.  It was like everything that we females usually frown upon was being overlooked because he was a celebrity.

He made his remark and to my surprise a large amount of willing young women expressed their interest in coming to the stage to dance. Personally that fact did not surprise me, what surprised me was that despite being referred to as a female dog they still eagerly went on stage and danced for this man that seemed to have no respect for them as individuals, if they got to close to him on the stage his body guards would push them back. I understand that they might have been a little excited to see Juicy J. But I hope next time they come across an opportunity to dance with a celebrity that they do it in the most tasteful, respectful way. I hope that they understand that the only way to be treated like a queen is to act like one and to know your worth.

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3…2…1…Slightly Move!

An Elective on Perspective

                                                     by UMES Junior Brittany Johnson

3…2…1…Slightly Move!

Direct action is to shift from the order of the day. Did you know that? I didn’t know that. I didn’t know that until I went to our Black History Month lecture by our UMES alum, Sherman Lambert. This shed light on my own partial commitments. Not being for something but not feeling strongly enough to speak out against it creates a blurred line so that you yourself no longer know where you stand, all boundaries erased. 

You have to feel out the situation to know where you stand! Well, while feeling out the situation you may compromise your own position because you didn’t directly oppose; rather, you endorsed it by default. If you’re not standing against, it would be too easy to assume that you are standing for.  

Indefinite terms leads to indefinite feelings which result in indefinite actions. Kind of like how most people think that “resist” means, “to crawl away and hope that it catches you.” When in reality, it means to abstain from, oppose, to stand against; just as “shift” doesn’t mean “slightly move” but to change direction completely. But, this is the world that practices half doing things. We half way love people and expect a full relationship. We half way take care of people and expect them to be fully sufficient on their own. We half way speak up and expect to be heard. We half way study and expect all of the credits. We half way work and expect to reap full benefits. We ease on down the road and expect full profit from our half way efforts. 

No one has ever made it to their destination only willing to make half of the trip.

Indirect action is to somewhat move from the order of the day. Now that sounds doable! That sounds much better than direct action. Direct actions require too much consistency and purposeful doings. In the words of my esteemed Sweet Brown, “Ain’t nobody got time for that!” Good observation, Sweet. I know I don’t have time for that. Although indirect routes lead you off course, onto a course that not even you can delineate, I think I’ll take my chances. We’re here to drift, right? I think not! We live in a world, in a universe, in the midst of space, and this world is spinning on its own axis to make its course purposeful, ordered, and direct. I conclude that even the most seemingly unbalanced wonders need precise groundwork in order to function and stay consistent. Don’t be afraid to make your actions purposeful and direct. The world can never fulfill its purpose believing it’s a motionless star.    

You’ve just taken, An Elective on Perspective



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The Real Life @ UMES Blog is a place for our commentary and opinions about what life is really like @ the University of Maryland Eastern Shore. It is not designed to express the views and opinions of the University as a whole. Peace.