On Graduating…

As I sit here in my partially packed dorm room, my roommate having already mostly moved out, it begins to hit me. I’m graduating this weekend from college. It seems like just yesterday I was tossing my hat up for my high school graduation and now I’m preparing to graduate from university. Crazy how time flies. Graduating would be much more exciting if I knew what my future held for me- but what would be the fun in knowing what I’m doing with my life… It’ll all work out, but now seems like a good time to reflect on the past four years.

It all started when I moved into Swanson Hall freshman year. I was introduced to my roommate and my suite-mates (one of which would become my roommate for the next three years). I remember going to my very first class as a college student, being scared to be on my own, being scared that I wouldn’t be able to keep up with college classes. Soon all those fears passed (after a few pep talks from some of my oldest friends) and I began to grow. I learned some fun skills in my photojournalism classes from award winning photographer Fr. Don Doll, I learned how to use the adobe creative suite, I learned everything there is to know about Greek Art, I learned new things from my core classes, and I struggled through my Philosophy classes. Through all of this I came to grow as a student and as a person. However I must say that most of the growing and emerging into adulthood didn’t happen until I studied abroad. It was then that I truly learned how to be independent and discovered who I truly am.

My college years just flew right by and I feel like I could have used this time in better ways, but at the end of the day this is how I spent the past four years and there’s nothing I can do to change it and I can’t complain about who I am and where I’m at right now so I must have done something right. I tend to think about what could have been when it comes to the last four years; things I could have majored in, groups I could have joined, places I could have been. But the last four years have been a big stepping stone for me and I think I’ve come out of my college career ready to move on to the next step. I also have had the realization that maybe just maybe undergraduate life isn’t supposed to prepare you for a job, but it is to prepare you for real life. I’ve learned more life skills during college (more while abroad than stateside) and I feel like even though I don’t know what I’m doing I might at least know how to get there once an opportunity arises.

Overall the benefits of my college career outweigh the regrets. If I had done things differently I wouldn’t have my amazing barn family and I wouldn’t have gone to London, two things I wouldn’t change for the world. I will be proud to walk across that stage and accept my diploma in front of my classmates and family. Thank you to everyone who helped me on this four year journey through college. I can’t thank my family and friends enough for helping me to follow my dreams. Also- shout out to my horse and barn family who kept me sane through it all (mini-shout out to Ross Nye Stables in London whose ponies kept me sane during my time abroad). Happy graduation class of 2014, don’t focus on the ‘what ifs’ but on what we accomplished in college because it kinda is a big deal. We did it!

The Creative Process: Concept Sketch Final Project

 

For my final project in my concept sketch development class we were assigned to design a logo for a company that was to be a brew bistro that was located in an old garage. We had to include all aspects of the business in our logo design. This is my thought process and sketches that went into my final design.

My thought bubbles that helped me figure out what direction I wanted to take the logo exactly. This helped me narrow down ideas and get rid of foolish choices that wouldn’t make sense. What follows is some of my favorite logos that I sketched. I also found that after going through the correct problem solving steps when I sat down at the computer to put it all together it came together in no time! I wish I would have had this class from the beginning so I could have used this method my entire four years of undergrad.

 

This is the final product that I came up with. I like that it connects all the dots that need to be connected and I find it to be clean and creative. The chef hat represents the bistro part of the business, the key on the end of the “s” represents the fact that the business was “started” in a garage, and the wheat represents the growing brewery that the company is hoping to have. Overall, I am very pleased with how the creative process went and I am proud of my end product.

Social Media Reflection: A Semester in Review

The end of another semester (my final undergraduate semester) is coming to a close. In my social media class I learned more than I had ever hoped to learn and more. From learning analytics I’d never even heard of to learning what content marketing meant, I’ve found a new way to use social media. I’ve learned about the best times to post on social media and even about new social media platforms I’d never used before. I learned to use Google+ and I’ve found that the audience that is reached there is completely different than the audiences I already reach on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. I made a successful LinkedIn account and have used it to network with people from grade school, high school, college, study abroad and more. I am excited that I can use this new tool to make connections and help me with my job hunt. I loved that we learned to use tools like Klout, Kred, and TweetReach. I’ve been monitoring all those sources all semester and I’m proud of how my scores have grown.

My Klout score is currently a 59, but it has been teetering on the verge of 60 and 61 some days. I am proud to say that I use social media well and reach a lot of different people with my posts. Using Klout helped me realize how influential I can be if I post correctly.

Kred still kind of confuses me. I’m still unsure if I’m doing well. However my score has increased a LOT over the semester! Almost up to 630 when I started out in the low 600s at the beginning of the semester. However I do use this to figure out if I’ve been posting enough content across all of my platforms to make an impression, so maybe I do know how this stuff works!

My tweet reach might be the most impressive stat that has changed. At the beginning of the semester my tweets were only reaching about 200 people, look at me now!

Our visit to the humane society was something I appreciated a lot. Not only did we get a chance to see some adorable animals, but I also learned a lot about how to run social media effectively.

Making a social media analysis and then using the analysis to form a plan might be one of the most realistic projects I’ve ever done in school. I hope that I get to use my plan that I made or at least get the chance to do the same thing one day when I have a job! I think that this ability to analyze as well as formulate a plan is the most important skill I learned in this class.

Overall, I thoroughly enjoyed this class. I’ve learned a lot about social media (including that MySpace is back). I’ve also gained appreciation for those who run large social media- it takes a lot of time and energy to get multiple accounts on different platforms to have a similar look and feel as well as share content on a regular basis and answer back any questions or concerns. I cannot imagine the amount of notifications some of those Facebook and Twitter pages receive for larger companies, or even just the humane society! I found this class interesting and I can see myself using the skills I learned in this class in a professional situation. I think that this class was a great way to round out my degree and makes me a more useful job candidate.