Nube Airiana Munoz

The Honors Experience was an amazing event that was held on June 21^st of 2015 at Stockton University. It was hosted by students of the Honors Program. The Honors Experience was an overnight event in which newcomers to the Honors Program could experience a glimpse of what it feels like to be a part of the Honors Program. New Honors students including myself arrived at Stockton on a Sunday morning excited to begin a day that promised to be worthwhile and would ultimately mark the beginning of a new chapter in our lives. After check-in parents and students had lunch together and listened to upperclassmen members of the Honors Program introduce themselves and speak about the different variety of clubs and organizations that they were currently involved with on campus. It was fantastic to find out about the countless clubs and organizations that Stockton had to offer so that students could participate in something they truly enjoyed while at the same time being able to get involved outside the classroom.

Then, it was time to say goodbye to our parents and head over to the first activity of the day, which was none other than Irish dancing. It was now time to meet other incoming Honors students and start to bond and get to know one another. Everyone sat in a circle, and we went around introducing ourselves and where we were from. Moments later an instructor showed us some steps of Irish dancing. We all were confused and without a doubt everyone or most of us messed up the steps, but we did it together and had some real fun. As the day went on we had some more fun when we started playing some icebreakers. One of the icebreakers we played was Ships and Sailors. It was a good time and so was playing volleyball together.

The night would eventually have to come to an end, but not before eating dinner together and participating in some service learning projects. All students helped make dog toys and care packages for kids that were less fortunate in the area. This provided Honors students with a sense of what it feels like to serve the community. Upon completion of the service projects there was a reflection session. During the session everybody discussed why we did those particular service projects and what we learned as a result of completing them. Everyone learned that they made a difference just by doing simple things. The event was now officially over, and everyone would have orientation in the morning, but the Honors Experience turned out to be a special day that would not be forgotten. The Honors Experience didn’t just introduce us to the program and new members; it introduced and welcomed us to our family away from home.

On Monday September 23, 2013 the Stockton Theatre Club hosted a free show based off of the TV show Whose Line is it Anyway?  This new adaptation of the popular TV show was amazing.  The show started off with a handful of the on-stage actors getting up and preforming a pantomime slideshow for an imaginary trip to the Niagara Falls. Two other actors narrated what was happening in the scene.  One actress named Kate was described as the one who goes over the falls and dies. She remained in the show, but the “death” stuck around as a running joke throughout the show.  This was followed by a game called The Alphabet Game.  In this game, two actors, Dan and Kate, are given a scenario of how the first time they meet. The scenario they were given involved them getting lost in a corn maze.  Alternating lines, Dan and Kate had a conversation. However, the catch was that each line had to start with the letters of the alphabet in order.  Once the dialogue got to the letter “Z” the game was over and the team moved on to Space Jump.  In Space Jump, two actors start on stage. New actors enter and the scene changes until every actor who is participating is on stage. Then they begin leaving making the actors go backwards through scenes until the original two actors remain on stage.  This game had the actors start out wrestling an alligator, to celebrating Thanksgiving, to talking again about poor Kate’s death at Niagara Falls.  Then the party began!  Seriously, the next game was called Party Quirks. There was a host for an imaginary party and three guests.  These guests were given quirks that the host did not know.  Once the party began the guests were not permitted to leave until the host discovered their quirks.  One girl had to sing “Twinkle Twinkle Little Star” while another danced to “Oppa Gangnam Style” whenever the host looked at her, and the final guest had to pretend he was turning into a werewolf.  This game is always a hilarious one to watch.  Party Quirks was followed by the Rhyming Game.  In this game, three audience members are selected and set in a line of the actors.  Two at a time, those on center stage have a conversation where the lines must rhyme. If the lines didn’t rhyme, the person who failed to rhyme went to the back of the line.  Next were monologues, in this game a panel of actors are on the stage and an event is selected.  The selected event was Black Friday at Walmart.  Then with this information each actor picks a character and scenario they will monologue about.  In this scenario a poor little girl was trampled while looking at a 12-inch TV she longed to buy while a hobo took the TV.  The Dating Game was the next endeavor for the actors to experience.  One man, Josh leaves the room while three girls are the potential dates for him, but they are given famous personas.  One girl was Fat Amy, one was Luke Skywalker, and the third was the Tooth Fairy. Josh had to ask a few questions in the dating game until he could guess whom the three contestants were.  The final game was Survivor.  This game holds true to the game of survivor. A scenario is set, like this one where the actors were stranded on a desert island.  After the scene was enacted, the weakest actor was voted off and the whole scene was repeated with that actor now missing.  This continued until only one actor remained. Taylor was left alone to act the part that seven other actors had not been able to do.  She yelled at herself and fought with herself.  At one point she even became some sort of animal and chased herself.  This show was very entertaining and full of laughs.  The humor throughout the show was consistent.  I cannot wait for the next Whose Line put on by the Stockton Theatre Club!

On September 24th 2015, Stockton University held its annual Convocation for the new freshmen. The speaker this year was Dr. Valerie Purdie-Vaughns. Upon arriving to this event, many of the freshmen filled up the entire Performing Arts Center. Many of the students did not even know what to expect coming from the event because professors told everyone to go due to its importance. After a short introduction by the Student Senate President and Professor Lenard, Dr. Purdie-Vaughns appeared on the stage in front of the large audience.
Dr. Purdie-Vaughns then began to talk about many different aspects included in the book Whistling Vivaldi by Claude Steele, which was the required reading material for all freshmen. Therefore, everyone would be able to gain a deeper understanding of the concepts mention in the book. Dr. Purdie-Vaughns began her discussion by explaining how everyone in the room can be stereotyped in some way. This means that every person can have a stereotype thrust upon to them. Furthermore, Dr. Purdie-Vaughns showed how people with the same birthdays feel a special connection even though they do not have anything else truly in common. She then related this to stereotypes and how people with a common stereotype can feel a deeper connection just because they are faced with the same stereotype as them.
Additionally, Dr. Purdie-Vaughns’ presentation also explained the concept of stereotype threat. In fact, she explained how stereotype threat is can be subconscious, as well as conscious. Therefore, people do not always have to be completely aware that they are undergoing some sort of stereotype threat. Lastly, Dr. Purdie-Vaughns also described how stereotypes can be local to a certain area. This means that a stereotype present in North America might not exist in a different part of the world.
Overall, Convocation provided a lot of insight on the topics presented in Whistling Vivaldi and stereotypes in general. Dr. Purdie-Vaughns gave an excellent presentation that intrigued the audience. I am glad I was able to attend this presentation because it was very insightful and made me even more aware about the stereotypes in our society and how they affect people.

On September 7th, 2013, I participated in the 10th Annual Day of Service. This day is focused on volunteer community service in some area of New Jersey. This year was located in Atlantic City with over 20 organizations involved in helping this wonderful city. I was extremely excited to participate in this event because community service has always been a favorite thing of mine.
When I arrived at the Campus Center that morning I was given a T-shirt, unfortunately an XL because all the smalls were taken, and I was given breakfast. When breakfast was done, we were shown into the Event Room where there were signs with different community service projects I could choose from. My friends and I had no idea what group we wanted to join, so we asked around to see what all the organizations were about. We had gone to the Peace Keepers group but they were all full, but then we found the Stanley Holmes organization. Stanley Holmes is a community center for a neighborhood in Atlantic City. The directors for Stanley Holmes wanted to use the Day of Service to get the children of this neighborhood excited to go back to school. I was very happy to be a part of this organization because I love working with children and making them happy and pumped for their first days of school. And that is just what we did. The activities that we had at the community center were pizza, an ice cream sundae bar, face paint, and many many board games for the children to play with. I was working the pizza station with some of my friends, and it was such a great experience. All the kids who came to this event were so sweet and just had the biggest smiles on their faces. It really warmed my heart to see all these children of different ages coming together and enjoying a fun day and getting excited for school. My absolute favorite part of that day was creating a bond with some of the children. One girl named Maria really has a special place in my heart. She was just such a vibrant girl and could light up a room with her smile. Seeing her and the other kids enjoying their pizza and ice cream, getting their faces painted, and participating in vigorous games of Spongebob Operation really made me realize the importance of education and friendship.
I must say that the 10th Annual Day of Service changed my views of life and opened up a special place in my heart. I will most definitely be back next year for the 11th Annual Day of Service.

On September 26th 2015, Stockton hosted its first and last home cross country meet of the 2015 season. Many spectators came to watch this event because it was the Osprey men’s and women’s only home meet this year. The match took place on the athletic fields on the north side of campus off of Pomona Road. When we arrived, many teams were warming up to prepare for the run. In total, fifteen men’s teams and seventeen women’s teams competed in the race.
The women’s teams ran first. At the start of the race, all seventeen of the women’s teams began the run across the field. The spectators stood close by to cheer on all of the teams. After the initial start of the race, the teams continued running the course. However, the spectators could not see the runners for most of the race because the course goes through the woods that surround Stockton. After about ten minutes, the women reappeared across the field for the middle section of the course. Once again, the spectators cheered on the runners as they then ran back into the woods. Then, another fifteen minutes passed before the runners sprinted to the finish line. One by one, all of the runners crossed the finish line with all of the spectators and coaches cheering on their teams. After the women’s race ceased, the men’s race then followed. The fifteen men’s teams ran through the same exact course with an equal level of enthusiasm from the spectators.
After the two races, it was time to announce the awards. Unfortunately, Stockton did not receive first place for either team. However, they still displayed an enormous amount of effort. The women’s team ended up placing in third, finishing only behind two schools, one from Pennsylvania and one from New York. Furthermore, two of the Stockton women runners placed in the top ten. The men’s team placed second, following only behind the school from Pennsylvania. Three of the runners on the Stockton men’s team received top ten finishes.
Overall, the Osprey Open was a great event showcasing the talents of the cross country athletes here at Stockton University. Even though our teams did not receive first place, there was still very impressive finishes for both the men and the women. All of the runners that participated in the race exhibited vast amounts of effort and showed how great the athletics here at Stockton can be.

As a continuation of Stockton’s seven year tradition, Stockton had Mary Roach, the author of Spook : Science Tackles the Afterlife, come speak.  After thoroughly reading Spook, I was a little apprehensive to listen to the author speak; I wasn’t a fan or necessarily interested in hearing what she had to say.  Spook went very in depth to a level that forced the idea of a dry presentation into my head.  However, when Mary Roach walked out onto the stage and admitted that she had never spoken in a place with the conventional seating of the PAC, the idea that Roach might not be boring slowly started to creep into my head.

Roach isn’t a woman with wild hair and thick glass that make her seem as crazy as her book may portray her as.  The light-hearted author was very down to earth, snarky, and not cocky about her fame.  After seeing authors speak, I figured that Roach would follow the same pattern, but I was wrong.  As a scientific author, she blatantly admitted “I don’t like science, I find it boring.”  Even though I like science, admitting something like that as a science writer made me really like Mary Roach.  Roach wanted things to be interesting in her book, and she seemed to push finding things interesting.

After the typical speech that college students get (to explore and discover), Roach explained that the only way her books got written were by her state of mind.  Mary Roach explained that, “I ask whatever questions come to mind.”  Roach followed up with an explanation of her investigation on what happens to oysters after people ate them, and explained, “Curiosity opens doors.”  When I heard this, I realized that even though Stockton has a lot to offer, there might be more hidden things around here that I have to find on my own.  My own curiosity is the only thing I have that will push me to be as successful as I hope here.

After Mrs. Roach gave her small speech, she opened up a question and answer session where she literally answered any question that a student would pose.  Listening to her talk completely changed my perspective on her.  She willingly acknowledged that the ending of the book wasn’t the best way to end it.  She had tried “to make a point about knowing and believing.”  Instead of a definite ending, Roach wanted the readers to be able to think about what really happens; she didn’t take the information and form an opinion for the reader.  I plan on reading her other books in the future because I think that I have a better understanding of her writing after hearing her speak.

If Stockton has more authors like Mary Roach come to speak, I’ll definitely frequent the events.  I think that sitting with almost the entire freshman class was a great way to help exchange some ideas about the book, and throw in some ideas from other freshman seminars.  After seeing this event, I’m really excited to start exploring RSC’s other events and can’t wait to see what the rest of the semester will hold.  Hopefully they’re as interesting as this one was!

Way back on September 15, 2015, I participated in my first tabling event. Tabling is essentially setting up a table in a popular location and grabbing people’s attention. The purpose of this event was to recruit blood donors for a blood drive that occurred over the course of the next two days. Two other honors students and great friends of mine, Jake G. and Anthony G., accompanied me in this event which proved to be both more fun and more successful than we had pictured it to be.
Our goal with tabling was to promote the blood drive and encourage people to sign up and donate. Dr. Kosick, who ran the tabling, hopped to have 95 donors on each of the two days the drive took place. People on campus are busy, and no one will willingly come to ask about our cause. In order to gain donors we had to work on our public speaking skills and talk students and faculty into at least checking out our table. If they were willing to donate, which many were, we explained to them the height and weight requirements needed to donate and other information about time and locations. Another successful tactic for promoting the blood drive was to walk around all of the cafeteria tables asking people to sign up and donate. If the tables were vacant we left a flyer on it for the next person(s) to use the table to see. We didn’t end up quite reaching our goal of 95 per day, but we gathered almost a full list for one day and about half for the next day.
This experience benefitted us as volunteers while helping the blood drive. We practiced and gained experience with public speaking. Approaching people isn’t always easy, especially when you’re trying to get something out of them. It take a skillful rhetoric to persuade someone who is undecided to make them sign up. However, it was all for a good cause. Donating blood can help many people with various need and conditions. One surprising fact is that donating blood is actually beneficial to the health of the donor. By giving blood the risk of heart disease. They are far less likely to experience a heart attack and the risk of any other type of cardiovascular problem is decreased by about a third. The theory, according to studies by researchers of the American Journal of Epidemiology, is “that iron has a significant impact on atherosclerosis, or hardening of the arteries. When you give blood you are removing 225 to 250 milligrams of iron from your system, thus cutting your risk of heart disease.” There are also the more obvious benefits of helping those in need of donated blood.

For weeks, GT has been telling us about Mary Roach and her amazing sense of humor. She assured us that, although we didn’t understand the humor in Spook very well, we would be able to understand it more after hearing Roach speak in person. While we were discussing the book in class, GT encouraged us to write down any questions we had for Roach as we would get to ask them at convocation. As the weeks went on and we continued discussing Spook, I did not think that anything could make me understand Roach’s humor in the book and nothing ever would.

Upon arriving at the convocation on Thursday, September 26th, I was a little saddened as I would most likely have to leave early and miss the question and answer portion of the event because I had another class to run to at six. To make my leaving worse, the student helpers sat me in the front row, where my leaving would be even more apparent. The lights finally dimmed at four forty five, and I saw GT walk out onto the stage, all smiles as she introduced her favorite author (after giving her class a shout out of course). Several people came out to speak about Roach and her amazing qualities, including the student senate president and the president of the college.

Finally, Mary Roach herself stepped out onto the stage. She was exactly what I had imagined- nicely dressed but relaxed. She opened up with humor about Stockton and her experience staying here, and I immediately warmed up to her. She was not the same person she came across as in Spook. Instead of just simply talking about her book, she discussed curiosity. Roach told us flat out that she was a curious person and that was the main reason she wrote Spook and all her books. She formed questions in her mind and had the initiative to go out and find the answers, while writing books about her findings.

Her humor came across greatly in person, just as GT said it would. At some points I would be feeling very serious as she talked about not being afraid to ask questions and find the answers. At other points in the event, I would be laughing hysterically as she discussed some of the weirder facts she came upon as she researched for Bonk, her book about sexual physiology. I found the way she spoke to be very similar to the way she wrote in her books. Although her humor might not come across in her writing, she makes it come alive when she speaks.

I ended up being able to stay for the questions and answers portion of the night and the crowd asked some pretty great questions that Roach was more than happy to answer whole heartedly for them. They asked about everything from her other books to her writing methods to her solutions for writing block. Looking back now I am surprised no one asked her about her travels around the globe! I was certainly curious about that but didn’t have time to ask the question at the time.

After answering many questions for the audience, Roach made her way outside of the PAC to sign books for students and faculty who wished to meet her and get her signature on the covers of their books. I, unfortunately, had to run to my next class and therefore could not have Roach sign my book, although I would’ve liked that. Overall, the freshman convocation was a wonderful event and Mary Roach certainly was an entertaining and interesting speaker. I think most people will agree that GT was right in telling us that Roach is a humorous and genuine author and speaker.

Books Without Borders is a club at Stockton that I am currently committed to. This club takes on the simple idea of providing libraries in need with the recycled literature we collect from donors. The clubs current goal is to fill a massive shipping crate to the brim with boxes of books to be shipped to libraries that require them, essentially in a foreign country. The jobs of club members varies from raising awareness of those who are not fortunate enough to access a plethora of books in their libraries to organizing donated books into categories, such as biology, chemistry, children’s books, novels etc. Donations need to be organized in these categories for ease of shipping, economic use of space in the shipping container, and to make sure people get the right categories of books.
I was introduced to the club at Day of Service 2015 where our president had volunteers organizing books into categories in such a way as I previously described. However, we also were featured as a club in a more recent event called Make a Difference Day. This day was compiled with multiple organizations doing hands on volunteer service. On this day we accomplished the organization of books that were causing donation boxes to overflow. After they were organized we trucked them to the shipping crate where we then organized the books in the crate and added our new boxes for the day.
This is a great organization with friendly people who put in effort towards helping others and making our club a family. We have movie nights, banquets, and are going to Philadelphia as a club to bond this coming Saturday. During our meetings every Tuesday we discuss events such as this, new ideas for fundraisers, and our ultimate goal of shipping out the books. This club also provides me with extracurricular activities to counter the boring time off that accumulates on campus and as a source of bonding with new and current friends.