Erin Smith

More by Erin Smith

Ode to Mama: Mother's Day 2013

5/11/2013

Mother's day is celebrated differently around the world. In the UK, it is celebrated the fourth day of lent as "Mothering Sunday" but in the United States we celebrate Mother's Day on the second Sunday in May. In honor of Mother's Day and Mother's everywhere, members of the HCTU team put together special shoutouts to our moms. We love them dearly and wouldnt be here without them so thank you all.

Valentine's Day and Anti-Valentine's Day Music Playlist

2/12/2013

Need some music to help you get ready for your special day? Or do you simply need some music to give you the tingly, floaty feeling of love? Celebrate this day of love by playing this playlist with the ones you love! Lay your hand over your heart and sway along to these tunes! Grab a hairbrush and dance along, and belt these songs at the top of your lungs. 

Valentine's Day is the one time of the eyar where every where you turn you find happy couples. But who wants to see all the lovey dovey couples when you're single or alone? So here's to all my single people! *Put your lighters up*

How-To: Check Your Area for Registered Sex Offenders

12/8/2012

We’ve all seen those famous images of vans that say “Free Candy” but we’re all a little too smart to fall for that (at least I would hope!). Every once in a while, you have those moments when you run into someone who you find extremely creepy or things just don’t seem right. Young or old, female or male, some people just automatically scream creep. I admit most of the time we are passing judgment but you can never be too safe.

 

One of the ways I stay safe is by checking the registry for sex offenders registered in the state of Maryland. When I first found out the database was online I checked it out of curiosity. Back then I was in high school and I felt my neighborhood was pretty safe, or at least my little section of it. It wasn’t until my freshman year in college that things hit home. One of my closest friends was searching the registered sex offenders list and she sent me a picture of someone on there that went to high school with us! At that point I knew it was something I should probably keep up with.

 

By visiting the website for Maryland’s Department of Public Safety and Correctional Services you can look up sex offenders by name, zip code, offender type or by interactive map. The website is very easy to use and gives detailed information about each offender. Want to check the website? There are two simple steps:

 

Towson Tantrum: Registering for Classes

11/19/2012

 

How is it that every semester it gets harder for me to register for classes than it was the previous semester? You would think that as you moved higher in credits, there would be more seniority, making more classes available. But each semester it seems like there are less and less classes available.

Most of the classes I planned on taking in the spring only have two open sections! WHHHHYYYYY? Why on earth are there only 2 sections of these classes? Most of them aren’t even big lectures. They are regular size lectures with about 20-30 people in them. If you ask me, the less sections you offer, the bigger the class should be. How am I supposed to graduate on time if I can never get into the classes I need? Are there more professors teaching Gen Eds than upper level courses? Does Towson need to hire more professors? Are professors teaching too many different courses? Like come on now why does one person teach like five different courses? Yea they may all have the same subject matter but that creates less classes.

Breast Cancer Awareness Month: Get Educated!

10/21/2012

With October being Breast Cancer Awareness month, I thought it would be nice to talk a stroll down memory lane. For those of you who have not seen me in person, I am a rather "busty" young woman. I’ve been that way most of my life. I went from Scooby-Doo training bras to a C-cup when I went through puberty. No in-between. My mom likes to make jokes about how when I was about 6 years old my step-sisters and I used to stuff our bras with tissue. She says all the friction created in the bra is what caused them to grow rapidly but of course science disproves that theory.

The truth? The size of a woman’s breasts is determined by genetics. In my case, I come from a family of “top heavy” women. My mom, aunts, grandmas and cousins are not too far from me in cup size, whether it is bigger or smaller. Breast Cancer is also something that runs in my family. My grandmother is a survivor and my aunt passed away this August after a long battle with the life-threatening disease. Seeing that my aunt was in her early 30s when she discovered the disease it made me very cautious as to what can happen with my body. Although only 7% of breast cancer cases occur in women under 40, women of any age can develop breast cancer so it is important to know the facts.

Guilty Pleasure: Reality TV

10/14/2012

We all have at least one guilty pleasure, whether it's eating ice cream late at night, shopping when you’re supposed to be saving, or listening to one of those overly catchy songs that everyone hates.

My guilty pleasure happens to be reality television. There is just something about people acting crazy, like they have no common sense, that makes it enjoyable. If you think about it, when do we really get to act like that? We don’t! We are at schools or in jobs where it is completely unacceptable to behave that way. I’ll admit, some of us have those moments where we may have had a little too much to drink or just feel like YOLO is our motto, but it would be a little extreme to act like that every time we wanted to have fun.

Some of my favorite reality shows include Bad Girls Club, Mob Wives, Love and Hip Hop, Basketball Wives, Real World and Real Housewives or any variation of the ones mentioned. I’ve recently run into a few new ones like Mama Drama and Hollywood Exes, but I can’t really get into them, and contest shows like America’s Next Top Model and American Idol have gotten old.

My favorite Reality TV shows

Student Launches Social Media Campaign To Bring Taylor Swift To Campus

9/13/2012

Every year Towson has two events that are expected to host celebrities; Homecoming and Tigerfest. This year, many students are hoping to win the chance to get one particular celebrity to make a special appearance in October, Taylor Swift.

One student has made it her personal mission to get T-Swift to campus. Nichole Pacifico created the Facebook event “TAYLOR SWIFT @ TOWSON UNIVERSITY. VOTE!” to help bring awareness to other students. “I saw a tweet go out from taylornation13 (her promo people) and one from Taylor herself advertising the contest. Being a huge Taylor fan, I jumped on the opportunity to get the word out to Towson!” said Nichole. She has been to five Taylor Swift concerts and even met her in person twice. “My three favorite songs are Our Song, Sparks Fly, and Eyes Open. Some of my professors even call me Taylor Swift in class, weird right?!”

Students have the opportunity to vote daily, until September 23rd, by going to the contest website, taylorswiftoncampus.com. They can also gain extra points for their school by liking the Facebook page of the contest sponsors or buy purchasing Taylor’s new single We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together on iTunes. The Facebook event has almost 500 students “attending” and Towson has collected over 3,500 votes towards the contest. The top 5 schools will be awarded $10,000 towards their music department and the number one school will enjoy a Taylor Swift performance on campus the week of October 15th.

Winners will be announced October 5th so if you’re a big Taylor fan like Nichole, keep the votes for Towson coming.
 

Summer Stories: Erin's Trip To Nebraska

9/8/2012

Before summer started I had everything planned out-- a few trips to Ocean City, a trip to Jersey and maybe even a trip to New York. But things didn’t go as planned. I spent most of my summer working, switching apartments and taking care of family business. My excitement came midway through when my boyfriend of almost four years told me he was coming home for a month at the end of August. I got even more excited when he asked me if I would come spend a week with him before he came home.

We are a couple that suffers through the trials of a long distance relationship. Sometimes I think we have things a little worse because he is in the Air Force. He is stationed in Nebraska while I’m here at Towson (that’s over 1,100 miles). He comes home one or two times a year and it’s usually only for about two weeks. You can imagine my excitement when he said he had a month worth of leave he could take at one time. I was kind of skeptical about going to spend the week with him though. It was a new place where I knew no one, and thought he would have to be at work all day. Plus, the first thing I think of when I hear “Nebraska” is cornfields, and those don’t seem that exciting. Things worked out in my favor. He had to work stand-by that week, meaning he would go to work at 4 a.m., but be home by 8 a.m. (while I was sleeping) and then go in for an hour in the afternoon.

Speed limit sign in Nebraska

Towson Tantrum: Finals

5/10/2012

That time of the semester is rolling around and yes I am talking about finals. I always find myself preparing an assignment calendar towards the end of the semester so I can know exactly how much time I have to prepare all of my assignments that are due. I add my finals onto the end so I know well in advance when I have to take what and decide if it is necessary to take off of work.

The fact that we have to take them is understandable; I mean it is college and we have to get tested on our knowledge somehow right? But while looking at my finals this year, I realized that I have to take three finals at 8 a.m. Not one....not two....but THREE! What type of sense does that make?! I can understand two because you can have an 8 a.m. everyday (my hat goes off to you if you do) but for someone who only takes ONE class at 8 a.m. how do I get stuck with THREE finals at 8 a.m.? How is that even fair? My body is so accustom to the schedule I've developed for the semester that getting up for three finals at 8am seems ridiculous at this point.

I've always found the finals calendar confusing, but I've never had this happen before. Usually when I have an afternoon class my final is around that same time, but for some reason this semester it's different. I haven't even mentioned all the projects I have due before finals. I don't understand why teachers decide to swamp everyone with last minute projects and presentations. One of my professors looked at the class syllabus and said "Why do I do this to myself?" and I was just wondering why do you do this to us?! We're struggling with your decision just as much as you. All the stress it takes for you to grade the papers, projects and presentations and THEN you have to grade finals too.

Weekend Getaways: A Trip to DC

5/3/2012 		A few weekends ago I went home to spend time with family and to see friends that I haven't seen in a while. My friends and I decided to take a trip to DC to see the Cherry Blossom Festival. We were all so excited to go on this trip because we had never been before. We met up at a Metro station near my hometown and headed down to DC. We got off at Metro Center station and followed the map to where the cherry blossoms were located.
    What Cherry Blossoms are supposed to look like