At the beginning of Winter quarter, I was honestly a ball of stress and anxiety. CSE 143 was a class I had dreaded taking because of how time-consuming and difficult I predicted it would be. LING 200 was a class I signed up for, just for the heck of it, but I really had no idea what to expect. INFO 200 was a class that had been incredibly difficult for me to get into, and because of that, I put alot of pressure on myself to do well. Aside from classes, I felt that I had so much going on outside of school as well. I was getting more involved in my college fellowship (attending weekly Bible studies, meeting with my accountability group weekly, attending worship practice weekly), and I was getting busier with badminton (going to Husky Team practice each week, attending club if I could on Mondays and Thursdays, going to the gym for extra practice). There was a lot going on, to say the least. This quarter of college was definitely testing, but it was also tremendously rewarding. I experienced so many new things, I met so many new people, and I was able to immerse myself into the communities I found at UW.
One of the highlights of this quarter actually began as something I was so NOT looking forward to. My first career fair--the Informatics-specific one! It was probably one of the most intimidating environments I had ever been in, but I was so glad that I pushed myself to go. As a freshman, I was scared, had nothing useful on my resume, and was not even in the Informatics major, but I decided to go because I decided this was the year I wanted to make more of my mistakes. It is always okay to make mistakes you can learn from, but it is especially okay to make mistakes as a freshman. (Or at least that's what I told myself :)) I honestly had no idea what I was doing. I would go up to the tables and introduce myself and ask about the different companies while I could hear other students talking about technical concepts and answering technical questions. Despite all this, I ended up having a really great conversation with the representatives from the US Navy Strategic Systems program, and I left the fair feeling excited and motivated to keep learning as much as I could.
The end of this quarter actually ended abruptly with COVID-19 quarantining. I moved back home. A week later, I returned my keys to Lander--goodbye to the fifth floor of Terry Hall. In a way, Winter quarter marked the end of my freshman year. No doubt, there are so many uncertainties right now. But as I'm writing this, I am simply overcome with so much gratitude for everything I've been a part of in this whirlwind of a quarter.
One of the highlights of this quarter actually began as something I was so NOT looking forward to. My first career fair--the Informatics-specific one! It was probably one of the most intimidating environments I had ever been in, but I was so glad that I pushed myself to go. As a freshman, I was scared, had nothing useful on my resume, and was not even in the Informatics major, but I decided to go because I decided this was the year I wanted to make more of my mistakes. It is always okay to make mistakes you can learn from, but it is especially okay to make mistakes as a freshman. (Or at least that's what I told myself :)) I honestly had no idea what I was doing. I would go up to the tables and introduce myself and ask about the different companies while I could hear other students talking about technical concepts and answering technical questions. Despite all this, I ended up having a really great conversation with the representatives from the US Navy Strategic Systems program, and I left the fair feeling excited and motivated to keep learning as much as I could.
The end of this quarter actually ended abruptly with COVID-19 quarantining. I moved back home. A week later, I returned my keys to Lander--goodbye to the fifth floor of Terry Hall. In a way, Winter quarter marked the end of my freshman year. No doubt, there are so many uncertainties right now. But as I'm writing this, I am simply overcome with so much gratitude for everything I've been a part of in this whirlwind of a quarter.