We Like To PARTAYY!! =]

After much anticipation, HOMECOMING WEEK is finally here! It’s now time to play hard but work harder! As homecoming week begins, many of us may forget the reason we are here at Howard and end up missing classes/assignments because of late night partying. During this week, time management and prioritizing will be the most important aspects! I do plan to go to many of the events, but I also plan to stay on top of my academics. Last night, to kick off homecoming week, Midnight Madness was held in the renovated Burr Gymnasium. It was my first time at Midnight Madness, since I am a freshman, and it was quite interesting. I expected more but it made me even more excited for homecoming and the basketball season. As the men’s basketball coach said, we should all support our teams and Howard University should have the best home court support! As long as I can, I’ll be at all home games. =]

-CarinaF. <3

Crunch Time...

OK. We have now finished our class meetings and will be working on our group projects. I honestly can say I might be a bit afraid of this project. I have not gotten the chance to know my group members yet so I am not sure of their interest or majors or anything really. This scares me because we might all have an academic leader in mind that we would love to research about, but hopefully we will be very adult about this project and get it done. Other than that I am excited for this project and the new information we will obtain.

On a different note, this week is homecoming week! They have already started off the festivities with midnight madness at Burr Gymnasium. This will be my first homecoming at Howard U and i must say i am very excited. Although homecoming is here this is also the time i must put most of my attention towards my academics. It is the middle of the semester and i do not want to become lazy and end up failing. I need to find the balance between fun and my studies, especially this week. I hope you all have a great homecoming week!

-Kapri

MIDTERMSSS!

I realized that college is not what I thought it would be. I have never in my academic career struggled in all my classes like this. Everything is moving to fast for me. I miss my family and I can’t keep up with my class work. But I know that God wouldn’t have brought me this far and put me through difficulties I couldn’t handle. I’m trying my best to stay on top of my game in class and I’m not going to give up. Being a Nursing major is no joke and it’s only going to get harder. I love Howard and I realized that what ever I’m going through is not because of the school it’s because of me, and what I can manage. I received all satisfactory grades on my midterms but I know I have to work harder. Getting a 4.0 is harder than what I thought and at this point I’ll be happy if I received a 3.0. I can’t wait for homecoming to come so I can get a break.

SPECIAL EVENTS 2 - MS. EVERS' BOYS

First off, I would like to say that the “Ms. Evers’ Boys” production was amazing. Had it not been for the requirement of Freshman Seminar I probably would not have attended but I’m glad that I did. This play showed the talent of the students at Howard University. They did a great job reproducing this play. The set for the play was remarkable and everything seemed as if I were actually there. The play was told through the eyes of Ms. Evers and based off of a study called the Tuskegee Study. Ms. Evers had to take care of the black men that were in this study and they were no only patients but also friends to her, hence the name “Ms. Evers’ Boys”. I really enjoyed the played and it turned out to be more than just a class assignment. The emotions of Ms. Evers could have been felt throughout the play and I would recommend this play to anyone who is looking for GREAT entertainment.

- CARINA F. <3

Ms.Ever's Boys

This show was absolutely amazing! It was a tear jerker. I feel bad for Nurse Ever's because she was really playing tug of war with her self. She was trying to help the boys and and do her job at the same time. I know she had so many burdens on her back. I just wish the boys could be as understanding as Ben was. I loved the set also. The whole production felt more like a movie than a play. It was so real, the emotions, the characters, the conflicts, everything. It was amazing to see what talent we have here at howard. I really enjoyed the little comedic lines they had to lighten up the show, such as the time when they were talking about how they had "obligations" to fill and giving blood would take away that "obligation". It took me a while to get used to the time period of the play. When they talked about their education and how Mr. Ben couldn't write his name. That was absolutely sad to me that at 50 years old he wasn't educated. All in all I would love to see the show again.

-Kapri Robinson

Practices of Freedom and Justice

Our presenter for this week was Dr. Leslie T. Fenwick, the dean of Howard University’s School of Education. She began her presentation with a series of questions, requiring us to think on everyday topics. The one question that stood out to me was: “Which group scores higher on college entrance exams? African American males or females?” Surprisingly, according to the national data acquired from college entrance exams, black men score higher than black females. If this is true, why are black males underrepresented in the college community? Why aren’t more black males striving to be greater than they already are?

The goal of a Howard graduate is not to merely get a degree, but to transform and empower the world. To do so, we must know statistics, including the underrepresented data. In order to help our community, we must KNOW about our community. We must think about experiences in our community, and the world as a whole, and raise research questions. How can we help this? How can we change this? What must be done in order to get certain results?

Dr. Fenwick took on this challenge in her book and we should do the same.

-CarinaF. <3

Downfall of Education

This week Dr. Leslie Fenwick gave a lecture. She first asked questions about different statistics about the African American Culture. They were questions like what percentage of teachers are African American, who is more likely to score higher on standardize testing African American males or females? These question puzzled many of us and the answers to the question shocked the majority of us. She asked these questions so that she could introduce her new book and its importance. The book explains how the desegregation was ultimately the downfall of education among Black people. Dr. Fenwick and Dr. Richard Wright had some of the same views concerning this topic. It surprised me to hear this once again. Dr. Fenwick explained how there was a huge drop in Black educators and Blacks in Educated Authority positions after the case of Brown vs Topeka Board of education. As she explained the data I began to see the truth in her words. It began to sadden me to think of how we no longer hold the positions they used to.