This online semester at UC Berkeley went by quickly, and until now, I hadn’t reflected on my experience as a transfer student. Last semester at my community college, all my classes were online, so I felt somewhat prepared for this semester. However, I feared that it would be a drastic change regarding the difficulty of assignments, and being prone to procrastination would not be of any help.
In my first weeks, everything went smoothly. The readings were manageable, and getting an overview of what I was going to learn made me excited. I also found incredible virtual communities. This semester’s highlights were applying for Her Campus, becoming a part of the writing team, and creating articles covering topics I am passionate about or what I learned in my classes. In addition, I got to meet excellent female writers and became a part of an inspiring organization. Another highlight of my first semester was working on group projects for several courses. Group work allowed me to meet classmates with the same interests as me (K-pop!) and made me feel like I belong at Berkeley.
Now, I’ll move on to the challenges. This semester, I was working part-time and was a full-time student. I worked eight-hour shifts every weekend, so I didn’t have much time and energy to do school work by the start of the week. However, I somehow managed to get through the semester and learn how to take advantage of my free time.
Although I tried my best to stay organized, I ended up procrastinating and pulling a few all-nighters. In order to stop myself from putting off assignments next semester, I will come up with fake deadlines for my schoolwork. That way, I can finish the assignment well before the due date and have extra time for revisions.
This semester, I learned a lot about myself. I discovered that I can achieve anything, and that I do belong at Cal. I also met amazing people who will help me learn and grow. Who would have thought this could be possible through Zoom?