Busy Week!

Well, my Spring Break flew by! And here I am, already one week has passed since the break. This was an especially busy week for me. I had to transcribe the hour long interview with the Community College of Philadelphia student that I interviewed over break. It was a great interview and I'm really looking forward to hearing his story. I realized something that we had talked about in class--I had made some assumptions about the experiences of this student that are very false. We talked about this in my Ethnography course, that it is human nature to make assumptions about people but after transcribing the interview and listening to the tape I realized this student's experiences were quite different than what I had expected. And for that I am glad!

I also had to hand in a research proposal for my for my Cultural Perspectives on Human Development course. I have decided to look at the experiences of immigrants to the U.S. and what factors affect the acquistion of English and the maintenance of first language by immigrant children and adolescents. I have to say that I feel lucky to have so much freedom in my courses to really explore topics that are of interest to me, as opposed to being forced to concentrate on an area that is chosen by the professor. More often than not I have been in control of the research that I conduct, which is empowering.

I had another paper due for my Globalization and the University course. This was a short paper in which I decided to look at the impact that distance education has on international education, from a U.S. perspective. Again, the topic was quite broad for the paper--the readings related to quality control for distance education programs, such as the University of Phoenix--and I decided to integrate my interest of international education into the paper.

After a busy week I decided to enjoy the social aspect of Penn and on Thursday I attended the GASPA (Graduate and Professional Student Association) St. Patty's Day Happy Hour at Roosevelt's in Center City, Philadelphia. It was nice to see classmates outside of the classroom and relax after a busy week.


Friday was just as busy, as I attended the Annual GSE Career Networking Fair at the Inn at Penn. I found the panel of alumni speakers quite helpful and it was nice to hand out some resumes to potential employers. I can't believe how soon I will be done with my Master's! Not only did Spring Break fly by, but so is this year! Only about six more weeks of classes!

On that note, I need to get some reading done!! As always, if anyone has any questions please feel free to post a message here or email me directly.

~Lezlie