It's Summertime at ODU

I feel so bad for being so neglectful with this blog.  I just have so many blogs and journals right now that it's hard to keep on task with all of them.  Darn me and my need for creative writing outlets haha. 

It is summer break for ODU students now except for the few who have opted to take summer courses of course.  I contemplated taking a summer course myself, but decided I'd rather focus on work and friends this summer.  I am already limited in my free time as it is. 

So I decided not to graduate in May.  I still needed 2 classes to graduate, but I already had 5 first semester which was exhausting on top of Track and Student Senate and ResLife duties not to mention having a good relationship with family and friends and an active social life.  One of the classes I needed to graduate is being offered in the Fall with one of my favorite professors, Sister Fatula, so I decided to just stay the extra semester and take it with her rather than go through the hassle of finding a subsititute class and getting it approved and all. 

This has actually turned out to be a very nice blessing in a very obvious disguise since I was not at all ready to leave ODU yet.  It's not just that it's my home now and I can't bear to leave it for sentimental reasons though that is true too.  I am also just not ready to go out into the real world and be a grown up.  This gives me a little time to postpone figuring out whether or not I want to do grad school or travel or work to pay off student loans or beginning a "big girl" career.  The extra semester also gives me more time to build lasting friendships and leave the campus with a good lasting impression of myself.  And of course, I will increase my knowledge and Dominican thinking skills through the additional classes I will be taking.

If I hadn't decided to stay the extra semester, I would not have lucked out with the awesome job opportunities I have this summer.  At the very end of Spring semester, there was an opening for a position with ResLife and Student Development as a summer RA and an Orientation leader with food and housing provided for me on campus.  I also got offered a position working as a studen ambassador over the summer, so I am basically getting paid to live on campus and do various tasks around the school which is awesome since my family moved recently so I would have had a hard time getting just for a month or so over the summer.  It's also great to spend more time on campus before I graduate in December.  There's quite a few of my friends from ODU living nearby and visiting from around Ohio, so I am able to see a lot more people this summer than I got to in the past due to my lack of car and being one of very few Panthers from the Cleveland area.

It has been a lot of work at some points, but for the most part, this summer at ODU has been surprisingly awesome!  I feel I made the right decision taking these positions.  It's very beneficial for me emotionally, financially, physically, and socially.  I miss my family a lot, but I know I'd be bored, poor, and lonely if I had moved back home for the summer.  And it would have been very hard for me to motivate myself to find a job and really get on my feet especially if I had graduated in May like I was originally supposed to.

Basically, my point here is that ODU has really given me a lot- jobs, education, amazing friends, faith, and fantastic life experiences.  When I do finally graduate, I know I will be leaving here with great stories, awesome relationships, and the skills I need to survive in the real world and be the person I want to be.  I am not sure that any other school could have done for me what ODU is doing.  I am just so much better now than I was when I first entered Ohio Dominican in May 2008 for my Orientation.  I only hope that all of ODU's students can see and appreciate this amazing place and take full advantage of all it has to offer.  My biggest regret is not realizing this sooner.  My last 4 years could have been even more amazing had I taken the time to really explore and get to know the campus and get involved and build even more and better relationships.  So my advice to every college student is make the most of these 4 years, because you aren't going to get them back and they are over before you know it.  Every day can be an amazing day if you let it, so let your college years be amazing.  There's a lot your school can do for you.

On Spring Break!

I am about halfway through my Spring break and have really enjoyed my relaxation time.  I've gotten well over 8 hours of sleep each night and have had a lot of time to journal and blog which is fantastic!  I should actually be working on homework and my Track workouts a lot more though :/ but there's still time for that!  As much as I love being at home, I miss ODU more than I can put into words corny as that sounds.  I wish I had gone on one of the Spring Break trips to Detroit or El Salvador or Columbus to do some service work.  That would have been a much better way to spend my time.  I could've been helping make the world a better place while spending time with ODU folks and growing in my faith and becoming a better person.  One of my favorite friends is on the El Salvador trip and even though I miss him dearly, I am extremely jealous of the experiences he is having over there right now.  I have been following their blog and reading about all the amazing things they're doing and being a part of and it just touches my heart and makes me want to cry, it's so beautiful!  I really wish I had taken advantage now of all the wonderful travel opportunities ODU offers to its students.  If you are a student or are going to be a student, I highly recommend that you at least look into the programs through the International office and see if there are any trips you might be interested in.  And if you want to join me in following the El Salvador trip to learn a little bit more about the mission trip and our students over there now, here's a link to the blog:   http://oduelsalvador.blogspot.com/

bOwl-D-U!

Last night was college bowling night at HP Lanes on Innis.  So a whole group of us from ODU went and bowled for $1 per game, $1 shoe rental, and had some drinks which were a really great deal too!  I was a little sad that it was my first time at a bowling alley since I turned 21 and I couldn't drink with everyone since I gave up alcohol for Lent, but I still had a blast.  Seeing my friends have fun was enough fun for me!  And HP does this every Thursday night I guess, so if you go to college in the Columbus area and ever want to get off campus, it's a really good deal and it's super fun!  I ended up only spending $4.50 after being at the bowling alley for a little over 2 hours.  Not bad. 

Also, Easton Town Center does college ID movie nights on Thursdays and I believe tickets are discounted down to $6.50 instead of the usual $9.50, so that's not a bad deal either if you'd rather see a movie.

Basically, going to college in Columbus, Ohio is awesome!  There is so much to do in the city and there are sweet deals for college students all the time since it is quite a college-town in general.

VideODU

So ODU has had some less-than-favorable commercials made in the last year or so.  They got a lot of negative feedback from current students and this eventually lead to an initiative to get more input from students and faculty.  After many meetings and surveys and conversations, etc., Student Senate ended up hosting the very first VideODU film festival this year.  ODU students and staff were able to make videos to compete for prizes and a film festival was held to show all of the videos.  I made a video just as filler and it got 8th place out of 8 submissions haha, but here are some of my favorite videos that were entered: :)

I'm a Senior and I still LOVE ODU A LOT! :)

I can't believe it's more than 25% into my senior year!  I am not ready to graduate!  The thought is so sad and scary!  I have had such an awesome experience at ODU and everyday, it just gets better and better and more and more I am grateful for my education and relationships I have here.  I can't imagine life anywhere else.  Ohio Dominican has definitely become my home.  I keep joking about just not graduating, because leaving makes me too sad.  But don't worry, I am not that financially irresponsible :P.  I am really hoping to at least stay in the Columbus area so that I can visit ODU often even after I graduate.  The DREAM though is to eventually end up back here working in Admissions or maybe even as a professor of Theology somewhere very far down the line :). 
I feel like ODU just gets better and better every year!  And I do not want to miss seeing it as it grows into an ever greater university!  And I am not even paid anymore to write these blogs, so this is all me on my own time speaking right from my heart :). 
I feel bad that I haven't written in a while, but I have been super busy!  This year, I am working as a student ambassador and a phonathon caller again, but I am also an RA which is very time-consuming.  Also, the 3-credit switch has left me with a lot of homework and little free time :(.  I am also walking onto the track team with my sister who I managed to recruit here with my sweet ambassador skills :).  I am also trying to be more involved on campus in general and I am trying to spend as much time with friends as possible before we all go our separate ways in May :(.  Tonight, I am going to One Gospel at OSU through SPO and I am so excited to see a lot of my friends who have graduated or go to OSU or just live off campus.  We all might also go bowling afterward which might be fun!  Oh, I actually need to go get ready, because that is happening in 20 minutes haha.  But thanks for reading!  I love you! :)

You can still see my old ODU blog posts!

To see the blogs that I was paid to write last semester, you can click on this link! 

lainey's professional blog

I was really excited to find that it is still hidden in the internet somewhere even though there is no way to find it on ODU's new revamped website.

What's Good for the Goose is Good for the Panther

So I just wanted to give a mini shout-out to the adorable geese that have been hanging around ODU's campus for the month or so.  I keep seeing them while I'm on tour and they seem to really enjoy hanging around Sansbury Hall where I work and will be an RA next year! (Also where our main chapel, Christ the King, is!)  Today though, as I was walking to the library, one was sleeping while the other was walking around the sleeping one honking.  In my mind, my first assumption was that the one sleeping was a female and the one honking was her lover making sure she was able to sleep safely while he protected her with intimidating honks circling her little napping spot in the grass. My boyfriend who is an avid bird watcher was with me, and he assured me that I was probably right.  I asked if geese mate for life and he said they almost always do.  It always makes me so happy  when animals have life mates, because it makes all the more sense then for us humans to devote ourselves entirely to one person for the rest of our lives.  It was just a really beautiful moment I had thinking about how wonderful these geese are to each other and how much better we would all be if we treated each other like geese lovers do.  I hope that I am able to find a good husband who will protect me even if it means walking around in the rain and circling me while I sleep in the grass at ODU and honking at potential predators :)