The Barnes Museum Trip

One of the events that took place within the honors program, that was one of my favorites, was the trip to the Barnes Museum in Philadelphia. I thoroughly enjoyed this trip because of my love and deep appreciation for art. I had never been to the Barnes Museum so I was sure it was going to be an enjoyable and new experience.

The museum included two main exhibits, one on the lower level and one above. The exhibits were a series of rooms with paintings hung in an orderly fashion, sometimes completely covering the walls. Also, around the the paintings were various strange metal objects and pieces that somehow brought the whole exhibit together. Every painting was as beautiful as the last and what fascinated me the most was the age of some of them. If I looked closely at the frames they were hung in, I could see the year from which that particular piece was produced. Some of the paintings I saw dated back to the 15^th century. It was amazing to be that close to something that had survived for so many centuries.

I am glad I made the decision to come on this trip with the honors program. The experience in the Barnes Museum was definitely one I will remember. Not only was I able to see some incredible art, I got to spend the day in the wonderful city of Philadelphia with my friends.

Going into convocation, I did not really know what to expect. The whole freshman class had just completed reading Whistling Vivaldi by Claude Steele. The point of the book was to have people understand stereotype threat and how society could help diminish these stereotypes. A majority of the freshmen class piled into the PAC thinking they were just going to hear the same boring lecture we always have at these types of gatherings. Valerie Purdie-Vaughns walked out and immediately brought us into the conversation by having us talk. She included us into the conversation instead of just lecturing us.

She proceeded to talk about her research with Claude Steele and the experiments she had done. The conclusions that she came to were quite interesting to hear about and related much to the information that Whistling Vivaldi included. Valerie Purdie-Vaughns was very inspiring and strongly believed in what she was saying. She connected to her own life and her own college experiences to relate to us while teaching us how to reduce stereotype threat.

Convocation was a very memorable experience and I am grateful that the freshmen class was given an opportunity to have someone related to our common reading come and speak to us. Stereotype threat is a huge issue in our society and I think everyone should read Whistling Vivaldi and listen to the research by psychologists like Valerie Purdie-Vaughns.

Waking up early on a Saturday morning is never easy, but my excitement for Day of Service made that a little easier. When I arrived at Day of Service, there were so many faces I did not know but everyone had the same look of excitement to start serving the community. We were put into teams to help organize where we would all be going. My team, the blue team, first went to a session about different areas of the government. There, we learned about the fourth amendment of the constitution which is states our right to privacy. We also discussed the death penalty and afterwards I was given the opportunity to register to vote.

Next, my team was brought into the campus center event room. We were able to meet with Circle K members while they gave a presentation about the ways they have been diminishing the amount of people in the Atlantic County who are homeless. We were then given the opportunity to make sandwiches for the homeless shelter. With all of us working together, we were able to make over 200 sandwiches.

The next session was a presentation done by the Water Watch club. They discussed with us the consequences of drinking bottled water and how tap is better for us and the environment. I, personally, learned more than I thought in that session because I never knew bottled water could be so harmful.

Day of Service was a memorable experience. I was able to learn many things that I could use in the future to become involved and to serve my community. One thing that I wish was different about Day of Service was the balance between lectures and actual service projects. I felt there needed to be more service projects because that is what really makes a difference and it would make it more true to it’s name, “Day of Service”. I do think it was very important to learn about the different organizations and I am glad I involved myself with Stockton’s Day of Service.