Personally, I am tired of telling my Hurricane Story. I feel as though it has been told entirely too many times since we have been back in New Orleans alone. I thought I was finished with my story after I returned but I guess not. We all went through the storm, and it is a depressing topic that I don’t think needs to be revisited in every single class. Let’s recapture… August 27, 2005. This was supposed to be the day that I was preparing for my 19th birthday which was to follow the next day. Last year, when we fled the state for Hurricane Ivan, we were gone for a week and returned to school without missing a beat. So this year, when my friends and I heard the news of Hurricane Katrina approaching, we packed just enough clothes to evacuate for the weekend in anticipation of our returning for the following Monday. Luckily this is my sophomore year which means a few of my friends had their cars here. This made it easy for us to plan and execute our evacuation. We figured that everyone was trying to evacuate during the daytime so our best bet would be to leave after 11:00 pm. That had to be the best decision we ever made.
With little to no traffic and rain, our 5 hour trip to Houston, TX. turned into a 6 hour trip. I traveled with 9 other people and we were all fortunate enough to not have to find lodging. Luckily, my roommate’s aunt lives in Houston and was generous enough to let us stay with her. Upon arriving in Texas, we all took advantage of our “short” break, which turned into a not so short break after all. Some of us went to the mall, watched television, and even studied for our Spanish test’s that were coming up as soon as we returned to Xavier.
Then reality set in, we started watching news updates on CNN and all local news channels. My friends and I were devastated when we saw people on the top of their roofs, people sitting outside of the superdome, and outside of the convention center. Breaking news crossed the bottom of the screen talking about the school closings in the impacted areas. This information really frustrated me because the first thing that came to my mind was me not being able to graduate on time. So my friends and I did not waste any time. We immediately got on the internet and applied to some schools. To make an even longer story short, I wound up at Temple University in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
I did not enjoy my experience at Temple at all. I don’t know if I did not like it because it had an undergraduate population of 33,000 students, if it was because everyone smoked, or if it was because the teachers did not care. Being at a different institution really makes me appreciate all that Xavier does for their students and it showed me the difference between teachers that do not care and those that really do. I have never been so excited to get back to New Orleans and back to school. I really missed my home away from home.
So far the Intro to Biblical Studies seems like an interesting class. An hour an fifteen minutes is kind of tough for me to sit in any class, let alone a “bible study” class. Just when I thought I was finished with all of my history classes at here ol’ Xavier, here comes my Theology and ancient reading English class. They say the good thing about history is that it is always the same, never changing. True…. But I feel as though my brain can not take anymore history until it gets a little more interesting. Today in class, we found out that we, the students (that sounds like a preamble), will be teaching the class every Thursday. Student teaching always seems more interesting. Except for when we were forced to do it in university class, but that is a whole different story right there in itself that should be added to a different blog.
The grading policy for this class seems a little steep, impossible, cruel and flat out HARD! I guess it can not be that hard to write a blog, because after all, these are our thoughts as if we were writing in our own personal journal… except the fact that we are giving someone/ the whole class permission to read our thoughts. The word count of 1,500 words seems like a lot. I don’t personally care for a minimum amount of words. I feel as though a student should write until they have fully expressed themselves. It’s the quality that counts not the quantity. That’s when people start typing just to fill in blank areas and then it seems as though they are babbling and carrying on and on about nothing at all…
Group work, is good, is forces people to work together to have one good outcome, usually people that would not necessarily work together. It also paves the way to meet new people that may even share some common interests.
Having a teacher that has published a book really psyches me out. Because it means that you actually know what you are talking about, because sometimes I have teachers who don’t seem very confident in what the say, which leads to the students having doubts.
One thing that I know I will not agree on in class is the name scrambler that you spoke of. I feel as though if I know the answer, I will raise my hand and be recognized to tell the class how I feel about something. I feel that no student should be put on the spot for an answer. If they do not know that answer, it always automatically seems as if they do not know what they are talking about, or have not done the assigned readings to be prepared for the next class. When it could be as simple as not understanding the text. I personally do not like to be called on unless I have my hand up.
When I leave this class at the end of the semester, I hope to have learned things about the bible that I may have missed while I was asleep in Sunday school. Now I am actually being graded on what I understand, so I will take what goes on in this class seriously. Even though I was christened and raised in an Episcopalian church, I feel like I know less that the average person who attends church as much as I do. I understand that this is a Theology class and it is not going to just focus on Christianity, but I hope to leave with a better and fuller understanding of theology. Even if I don’t leave this class with an “A” it would not even matter because I will have better understanding of religion. (But it sure would be nice to have an “A” wink wink)
Honestly, the only reason why I enrolled in this course is because it is required for graduation. I can not imagine myself really being interested in religion for leisure. Yes it is good to know things about “what you believe” after all, I do believe in it right?!?!? Some things in the bible, I do believe but not all things, because after all it was written by a man for men, not by Jesus, God or the Holy Spirit. To believe in something that you have never seen is a powerful thought in itself. I already heard horror stories about Dr. Homan, but hey, to each his own… I hope to make the best of this opportunity. I have had hard teachers in the past and I feel as though it just challenges me as a student to further my intellect. After all, this wouldn’t be college if it were not a challenge, it would be too much like high school.
I don’t have much to say about the bible because I don’t have a deep background on it. Every time someone has an argument; they try to refer something to the bible. But that is not always a good idea because a man wrote the bible, and not Jesus or God. It is a good idea to have biblical studies, especially in catholic school because every student should know what type of religion they are representing by being at this school. Even if it is just Christianity as a whole.
Even though I have been in church since I was a younger child, I really do not know much about the bible. In my church we refer to the Book of Common Prayer rather than the Bible. So all I know is Adam and Eve, a little about Moses, and Kane and Able. So I am hoping to have a deeper understanding of the bible by the time I get out of this class at the end of the semester.
I’m sure I can write 1,500 words on this topic alone. Lets see, where do I begin, I have always wanted to be a surgeon since I was a little girl. My television would always be on The Learning Channel and not the Disney Channel. I knew for a fact that I wanted to be a physician, but I was not sure what field. So I went through the options of a brain or heart surgeon. I chose those because without either of those vital organs, the body is a vegetable and will not survive for long.
When I was about 10 years old, my brother and cousin were boxing like most teenage boys do. One blow too many led to my brother hitting his head on the side of the dresser. The contact of his head to the furniture led to him needing five stitches in the side of his head. Luckily a family friend, who is a physician was at the house when all of this took place. So she took my brother to her office to suture him. I was standing front and center and I assisted her in this manner. I cut the sutures and bandaged his head. It might not sound like a lot but for a 10 year old who has the dream of being a surgeon, it was. Now when I was a little older, and a little wiser, I decided that I wanted to be an OB-GYN. I believe my mother had a lot to do with that decision.
My mother has been a childcare provider for over 22 years now. I have always been around children younger and older than me, even though I am the baby of my family. I have always had to share my mother with everyone else’s children. So the thought that I could be a physician and incorporate children into my life was great. I mean that was two reasons right there… become an OB-GYN…. Right???? WRONG!!!! I grew out of children all together and wanted to make money. So I was into the profession of becoming a doctor for all the wrong reasons. I was money hungry. I did not take into consideration that I would have to wake up every day and go to a job that I did not enjoy, it is not worth the time, or stress, for me at least. So now here I am, at Xavier. I finished my first semester being a biology pre-med major and quickly decided that would not be the path that I wanted to continue. So before I got too deep into credits that I would need for another class, I decided to declare myself a deciding major. So now I am taking classes that I will need in order to graduate from Xavier. This is a good idea anyway because it gives me the opportunity to see what other departments have to offer. This semester I am taking 18 credit hours which consist of Theology, English, Sociology, Accounting, Spanish and Computer. I think that is enough at the moment to show me that there are other options out there besides sciences.
This class could have a lot to do with my career. I say this because anything is possible, I have not decided on a vocation and anything is possible. I am leaving my options open and hope to take full advantage of this class to see if it caters to my interests.

This entry was posted on Saturday, August 27th, 2005 at 11:37 am and is filed under Week 01: Background. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.