B is for Bachelor's Degree

Bachelor's Degree : a first degree at a college or university; B.A. or B.S.

[According to the Cambridge Dictionary]

Back in May I graduated from Ohio Northern. I received my Bachelor of Science in Business Administration, majoring in marketing. It's such a crazy time to think back on because at that point, we were all at the end and we knew it. We were all trying to spend as much time together and make the most of our final days - knowing that life as we had known it for the last four years, was coming quickly to an end. Definitely makes me a little sad - a lot sad - to be thinking back on it.

I think it's so interesting that after four years it all comes down to a piece of paper. It symbolizes all of the hard work and late nights that you put into the books and at the bar - college wasn't just about the classes and the degree. It was about growing up and making friends and making your way in a new place, even if that place was the cornfields of Ada.

I wouldn't give up a single memory from that place, good or bad and I cherish each for different reasons. Whether they're lessons - like don't try to ballroom dance with drunk boys because you'll end up with a black eye before Christmas; stories - like that one time when I dumped my beer on a boy at a party, or just the littlest, most random things that make the biggest impact - like nighttime talks between bunk beds, playing drinking board games and Country music before heading to the bar or listening to Christmas music while working on projects late at night in the business building, hiding from security to not get kicked out. 

Graduation. That was almost eight months ago! That's insane! I can't believe how quickly life passes and how everything changes in what seems like the blink of an eye. To those of you who are still fortunate to be in college, I'd like to say this - Quit your bitching! Seriously the "real world" is nothing like college and it's such a huge change. 

Enjoy the fact that you can take naps and can pull all-nighters and don't have class until 10. Take advantage of all the breaks you get between semesters and Summers! I don't ever get a summer break Ever Again! Spend as much time with your roommates and take advantage of every opportunity and adventure that you're lucky enough to come upon. But if you don't, that's on you and I hope you don't regret it once you get your fancy piece of paper and are trying to make it on your own out here. Just don't take it for granted.

Until next time

    -~- B.

B is for Bureaucracy

Bureaucracy : a system of administration based upon organization into bureaus, division of labour, a hierarchy of authority, etc: designed to dispose of a large body of work in a routine manner.

[According to the World English Dictionary]

The last time I talked about the American Marketing Association, I told about how my co-president, Chelsie, and I had completely restructured the group and strategy. Since then, we've gotten so much accomplished. We've done more in these first couple months than in the previous years that I'd been involved.
This is how we restructured the group to increase organization, focus and incentive:

1. We decided to implement a point system to measure and reward attendance to meetings, events and participation in fundraisers. At the end of each semester, we'll award the 'Member of the Semester' with a $25 gift card. At the end of the year, the 'Member of the Year' will receive a $50 gift card. The point chart will also be used to determine the allocation of our group funds for the trip to New Orleans for the International Collegiate Conference.
2. We also decided to have each officer keep a log of each of the activities/work that they did each month in their position for the group. This would not only measure which positions were doing more/less work than others, but it would give us a Transition Booklet to be used for reference when new members are elected into officer positions for the next year. These logs would also help us decide how to reorganize the executive board for next year, if need be.
3. Chelsie and I decided that both our group and officer meetings needed to be more routine and set into a schedule. We  keep everyone involved and interested in staying in the group if we met more than once every few months.
• I created a calendar for the year, marking each of the general and officer meetings in the schedule. This would allow members to know before-hand when we would be having meetings to schedule around them. Our semester schedule was also included with holiday breaks and special events, fundraisers and more.
• We decided to hold our meetings bi-weekly, with our officer meetings every other Sunday from 8:30-9:30 PM and our general meetings the following Wednesday from 7:00-8:00 PM. The schedule really seems to be working out well for us this year.
4. Finally, I completely re-created our chapter's website, since it was last updated in 2006 (not okay). You can check it out here at ONU's AMA Website.

We kicked off our year with a booth at WelcomeFest, where all the freshman are able to walk around our field house and check out all of the campus organizations and sign up if interested. AMA incorporated an interactive game into our booth and gave away prizes to get the interest of the students, and it was really successful. Our Kick-Off Barbecue, a few days after WelcomeFest, actually had a record number of attendees and interested students. We did typical introductions and ice-breakers, asking why they would like to be members to get ideas for later meetings and provide valuable experiences for our members.

Marketing Week was held October 17th though the 23rd, where we had a booth set up all week in the college. Monday we kicked off marketing week with a marketing research taste test where we had students use french fries to taste both Heinz ketchup and an off-brand label. The results were interesting though. With 70 participants, we had 53% voting on Ketchup 1 (Heinz) as best-tasting and 47% voting for Ketchup 2 (Off-Brand) as the best-tasting. Next for marketing week was having three teams of five people participate in the St. Jude's Up Til Dawn Letter Writing Event to raise money for the hospital. We also had a booth set up all week to gain donations, which went towards our New Orleans trip for the Collegiate Conference by being able to pie the professor whose jar collected the most money at the end of the week. We even had an incentive that if you donate money, you get a raffle ticket and a chance to throw one of the three winning pies! For the first time holding this event, we had a great turn-out. Finally, to end marketing week on a high note, our club took a trip to Cedar Point's Halloweekends to ride some roller coasters, learn a bit about the marketing efforts of an amusement park and enjoy the spooky atmosphere with the group.

Most recently, our group joined with the local Mexican restaurant to promote their business, encouraging the community and students to eat at the restaurant on Halloween, and in return, AMA would get 10% of each of the bills for profit. We also hosted a costume contest during the specified hours of 5-9 PM, where the winner would receive a $25 gift certificate. Our club made over $100, so we hope to hold the event again later this year.

-~- B.

Lucky Seniors

With only like three and a half weeks of classes left this spring quarter and then the dreaded week of exams, this school year is coming to a close pretty quickly. I know that the seniors here are dreading leaving and I completely understand that. I am absolutely grateful that I have another year in the college world, but I must say that you seniors are kind of lucky. I say this in regards to scheduling.
Next year we're switching to semesters and scheduling classes for next year is such a pain! Most of the classes are offered only in the fall semester or only in the spring semester. It's a good thing that I have almost all of my required classes finished this year and should be completed this fall, but there are probably three different classes that I would have liked to take that are not offered in the spring, so I just can't take them at all.
Also because I've taken most of the classes required for my marketing major, it is extremely difficult to find electives to take that are going to be interesting to me. I will not take another math class, another western civ or chemistry anything. Those classes are not my major for a reason. It also aggravates me when I finally find a few electives that I would like to take, then find out that they overlap in times and I have to choose which of the two I would rather take. Talk about frustrating.
So to those of you who are graduating this May, be grateful that you at least get to miss out on the stresses of picking and choosing classes in a brand new trial system for the first time. Luckily for me though is that I only have to deal with this for one year!

Family is Key.

Part of the reason that I chose to attend ONU is the location. I'm from St. Marys, Ohio, which is about 40 minutes south of campus. This is great for me because I'm pretty close with my family. My parents are wonderful. They do so much for me and always support the things I'm involved in. They would come up every weekend that ONU had a home football game to watch the cheerleaders stunt. It was seeing them and great to know that I had the biggest fans watching me every week. I felt really blessed that they would come, especially since most of the other girls' parents could make it to few games, if any at all.  The other plus to having my parents frequently visiting was that I could give my mom  my laundry and she would take it home and bring it back clean the next week!

The distance is also great, because if I ever really need to be home or just want to get out of Ada; I can do it. I've been able to go home for doctor appointments (and not have to wait two hours at the health clinic here) or to go home to watch my little brother, Jeremy, play tennis.

I suppose I shouldn't really call him little, since he's about to graduate high school. I'm really excited though, because he is coming to attend Ohio Northern this fall! I'm so glad that I will still be here at Northern for one more year and get to help him through his first year away from home. I know how scary it was to come to a completely new place and not knowing anyone. So me being here should help him feel much more comfortable here. He's actually coming up to visit and stay this weekend and he's bring our cousin, Ben, and their friend, Dylan. I'm excited to see him because, though I only live 40 minutes away, this will be the third time he's come to stay. I'm looking forward to taking the boys out and showing them around and exposing them to the wild Ada night life! Ha. I've got to get Jerm used to life at ONU; that way he'll know what to expect for the next four years. I've had an amazing three years so far, and I hope he'll feel the same about this place. It's definitely my home away from home.

ONU Life #1

Well this is my first blog, ever! I've given a passing thought to starting a blog once before, but never really had that inspiring moment to actually do it. Now I've got to write a blog three times a week for my social media class. This one will focus on my life at ONU, since I haven't started the readings yet and figured this shouldn't be too difficult.

Well I just returned from spring break, where I joined most of our cheer squad on a road trip/cruise to the Bahamas. The weather was great, especially since we left Ada in a blizzard. The trip was a blast. It was my first time on a cruise ship, and I wasn't disappointed.

After break and diving into spring quarter, I had a full day on Monday with classes scheduled from 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. I made a trip home after my final class let out for the night. Since I had been traveling every day over break, I didn't have a chance to be home at all and see my family. Going home was also my way to sort-of extend the break. I was home until this afternoon and being home was great. There's just something about mom's home-cooked dinners and being surrounded by family and pets that just keep you coming back for more.

Once I was back on campus, however, all of my responsibilities and assignments came rushing back. For this only being the first week of classes, I'm feeling a bit overwhelmed with all the work to come, the meetings, the hours of work and trying to find time for all of it. I'm hoping that my economics class is not going to be as near as hard as the first day seemed, though that may only be wishful thinking. I am really looking forward to this social media class, and Aggie knows the struggle that I had to get the override to be included. My consumer behavior class shouldn't be overly difficult, I don't think, but advanced marketing should be pretty interesting since the class is pretty much based on a market simulation game and how well you can run your "company" for eight years (read weeks).

Other than classes, I've got interviews being set up in my search for the internship required for graduation next year. I've also got a few long nights ahead of me for American Marketing Association (AMA) and getting our trade show booth all set up and ready for our national conference in New Orleans at the end of March. Work is also starting up again with the Phonathon and the sports department, where I follow ONU's track team and type up press releases at the end of each meet.

There are now only about ten weeks of classes until summertime. I absolutely cannot wait until the weather finally gets nice and warm, because though my schedule doesn't allow me very much free time, I love being outside and can't wait until I can break out my bike and rollerblades again.

Well that blog turned out to be a little longer than expected, but that's a pretty general overview of my current life at ONU.  Hopefully you learned something new and found a bit of entertainment.

Thanks for reading!!