On February 5^th I attended Life Size Monopoly, which was a part of the Up to Us campaign at Stockton. Up to Us is a campaign run by college students for college students to make them aware of the national debt. With this event, they intended to attract students in order to get them to find out more about the campaign.

Before Life Size Monopoly, I had to set up a team of two to four people. I had trouble finding people who wanted to participate, so I put a post on the Facebook event page saying if anyone wanted to play but did not have a team, I would be happy to help. After posting that, I found a friend who would participate with me, but when I went back to my room after that conversation I discovered that someone had replied to my post. Because of this, I was able to have a three-person team when we arrived.

For the game, we had to create a game piece and pick a team name. We knew there would be a prize for the best piece, so we tried to get creative. I have a giant teddy bear that is the size of a person. We decided to dress is up in a Stockton hat, sweatshirt, and lanyard. We also decided to call the team “Bear With Us”, which made me really happy.

When we arrived at the event, every table had a board game on it. We decided to sit down at the table that had Life. While we waited for our turn at Life Size Monopoly, we played Life in the hopes of winning a $5 Wawa gift card. While we played, a fourth girl was added to our Life Size Monopoly team. We were called up to play Monopoly before our Life game ended, so we did not win the gift card.

Before we began playing, our game pieces were judged. The guy in charge seemed pretty excited about our giant dressed up bear, but we were not the winners of that contest. Instead of using the entire bear as our game piece, which would have been extremely difficult, we decided to just use the lanyard that I had put around its neck.

The rules were a bit unclear at the beginning of Life Size Monopoly. Several new rules seemed to appear as the game went on and there certainly could have been a better way to inform us of how the game was working. However, that was not too big of a deal because my team finished as one of the top teams of the first round. There were two groups that were playing. After each group finished their first game, there was a final game between the three top teams of each group.

In the final game my team did not do very well. I am not certain what place we came in, but I would not be surprised if it was last. In the course of the night we did not win anything. However, we had a good time and we learned about the national debt. And that’s what really counts.

On November 18th, I attended a D200 floor program. Julie, our RA, ran a program about Barbies. She started the program by showing us a picture of a woman holding a Barbie doll. The woman had lines on her body that showed how a real human would have to change their body in order to have the proportions of a Barbie doll. The point of the program was to point out that Barbie dolls are a problem. Little girls grow up looking at this unrealistic figure thinking that this is how a pretty girl looks.
For the program, we created dolls of ourselves who’s body proportions were to scale with those of actual human beings. I am not the best artist, so drawing the doll was a bit of a challenge. I tried to make it look like my doll was wearing the same clothing as me. I gave her a blue tank top with a gray cardigan and black pants and flats. My hair color did not exist in the colored pencils we were using, so I just made her hair yellow. In the end, the doll did not look much like me. But it was close enough.
When we were done making the dolls, Julie took a picture of each one of us holding the doll we had created. These pictures were sent to the Barbie corporation as a form of the unrealistic proportions of a Barbie doll. After everyone had their picture taken, Julie glued all of the dolls to the paper we had used as the back drop for our photos. The dolls are still there on the wall in our hallway.
The idea behind this floor program is something that is very important. Many girls spend their childhood playing with Barbie dolls. These dolls give them an incorrect impression of what beauty is and as a result they strive to look like these dolls. Such an unrealistic goal is dangerous. The dolls that little girls play with need to be more realistic to the body proportions of actual humans.

On November 18th I attended the annual Scholarship Recognition Dinner. For this event, we were told to “wear appropriate business attire”. As I got ready for this event, I realized that I need to add this type of clothing to my closet. I have very few options for business attire and most of the options that I do have are dresses. It was very cold on the day of the event, so a dress was not the preferable choice. Five minutes before I had to leave, I able to put together an appropriate outfit that included pants.
When I got to the campus center event room, I was given a nametag that also had the name f my scholarship on it. I walked in and found my table. Everything looked very nice. There were beautiful centerpieces on the table and the napkins were folded the way that they would be at a fancy restaurant. Salads and bread were already out on the tables, but nobody was sure of the proper time to begin eating.
While we waited for the event to begin, everyone at my table tried to figure out if there was logic behind the seating arrangement. Based on my table it was not alphabetical order, scholarship type, or major. We never figured out if there was a pattern, though. When the conversation died down we decided to start eating the food that was in front of us even though we still were not sure if it was okay. Soon after that, someone came to our table and told us we could start eating.
The event began with some remarks from Provost Kesselman and President ____. After that, dinner was served. Chartwell’s really came through with dinner. Everything tasted great, especially the chicken. There was a sauce on the chicken that was absolutely delicious. I don’t understand why they can’t make N-Wing food taste like that.
After dinner, one staff member from every school introduced one student from the school. Each student talked about how scholarships have helped them to succeed. Many students mentioned that without the scholarships, they would not have been able to afford their higher education. As they talked, dessert was passed out. There were small portions of cake and pie and they were delicious.
Overall, I was happy to have attended the scholarship dinner. It is important that donors see the faces of the students they are helping. I was happy to be there as a show of my gratefulness for my own scholarship. Also, dinner was free and delicious.

On Wednesday, November 12, I participated in TheVoice, hosted by the Stockton Entertainment Team. I had signed up on the Monday before and got to work preparing my songs for the competition. I had not sang for real since I got to college, as I sing very loudly. I felt uncomfortable subjecting my entire floor to the sound of my practicing. However, the flyer for TheVoice promised prizes and I love prizes, so I got over it.

For the competition I had to prepare one minute portions of three songs. The first song that I chose was “Boots” by Liv Devine. I could not find an instrumental version of this song anywhere, so I messaged the artist on Facebook. She sent me the instrumental track under the condition that I send her a video of my performance. The second song that I chose was “Out Here on My Own” from Fame. The third song that I chose was “Cupid’s Got a Shotgun” by Carrie Underwood. I cut my songs to the one minute requirement and practices rather loudly for the next two days.

When I got to the Campus Center Theater on the day of the competition, SET was still trying to gather people to compete. Only three people had signed up and they needed fifteen to do what they had planned. By the start of the show, there were ten contestants. The majority of my floor made up the majority of the audience for the competition. That made me feel loved.

The show began and each of the contestants performed in the first round. Because there were only ten people, no cuts were made. We were separated into teams and each team was coached by one of the judges. Between the first and second rounds, an additional contestant joined, so we were up to eleven. After I sang and between the second and third rounds, we had a sort of jam session in the green room. One guy played guitar, some people rapped, and some of us sang. It was really cool.

It came time for the third round and the top four contestants were announced. I was in the top four, so I sang my third song. While the judges deliberated we had another jam session, but this time it was in front of the audience and smaller than before. In the end, I came in fourth. Everyone in the top four received a twenty-five dollar Buffalo Wild Wings gift card, so I was content with my placement.

Tonight I played BINGO at the campus center. I am a big fan of any campus activities that involve prizes, which is what drew me to BINGO night. When everyone came in, a swipe of a Stockton ID card got you three BINGO boards. (A few rounds into BINGO night, they decided to give us each a fourth board to work with.) I asked what the prizes were going to be and was told that there was $200 worth of WaWa gift cards waiting to be given away. After finding that out I was very excited to begin playing.

The way the prizes worked was that every time someone won a game of BINGO, they would be given a raffle ticket. Most games had more than one winner. When someone won on the full board BINGO games, they received two raffle tickets. I won one game of BINGO and received one raffle ticket.

Half way into BINGO night they did the first drawing. There were ten winners of $10 WaWa gift cards. I was one of those winners. While I wanted to be perfectly happy with winning one gift card, the girl at the table next to mine won three, so I was a little jealous. However, my car’s gas tank will be happy to get $10 worth of free gas put into it. As the night went on, I was not lucky enough to win any more games of BINGO. At the end of the night they did the second drawing for ten winners of the remaining $10 WaWa gift cards. Three out of the four people at my table went home with gift cards, which was pretty cool.

Overall I really enjoyed BINGO night. I occasionally went out to BINGO with my mom at home with the little old ladies in church basements. However, I had to pay to get in and I never won. It was great to play a free game of BINGO and leave with more money than I had when I arrived. I will definitely be attending future campus center BINGO nights.