Negin Shahrvini

In November 2008 I went to a two day conference which was held in Camp Casey, Whidbey Island. This conference was an opportunity for all of the students who were in the ethnic student center clubs at Western to share experiences and build relationships that will be sustained beyond the conference. I met new people, built relationships, and learned a lot from this experience. At this conference I also had the opportunity to share my Where I am From poem from my Diversity in Higher Edcuation class to the students who had come to the conference.

 I was a part of the LSU dinner committee which consisted of about 10 students. This committee was designed to help organize the big dinner event that LSU puts on every year. This committee was divided into subgroups; food, publicity, budget, and decorations. I was in the food committee and our job was to design a menu for the dinner. The dinner committee met every Wednesday for about 3 months. This was an amazing, but stressful commitment, but the end result was a success. I was very impressed with the overall dinner.

In November 2008 I went to a two day conference which was held in Camp Casey, Whidbey Island. This conference was an opportunity for all of the students who were in the ethnic student center clubs at Western to share experiences and build relationships that will be sustained beyond the conference. I met new people, built relationships, and learned a lot from this experience. At this conference I also had the opportunity to share my Where I am From poem from my Diversity in Higher Edcuation class to the students who had come to the conference.

 I was a part of the LSU dinner committee which consisted of about 10 students. This committee was designed to help organize the big dinner event that LSU puts on every year. This committee was divided into subgroups; food, publicity, budget, and decorations. I was in the food committee and our job was to design a menu for the dinner. The dinner committee met every Wednesday for about 3 months. This was an amazing, but stressful commitment, but the end result was a success. I was very impressed with the overall dinner.

I have been a part of Relay for Life for many years, but in the Spring of 2009 I decided to take a step forward and become team captain of the Latino Student Union Relay for Life Team. This experience has taught me leadership skills when working with a team. I had a lot of fun making posters, meetings, and setting up fundraisers to raise money. The day of the event our team walked around the track, volunteered to be in the kareoke event, and we were also a part of the team relay races. The Relay for Life event is an overnight event and throughout the night we recognized and honored those who have battled cancer, lost loved ones, and for those who have fought back against the disease.

In the Spring of 2009 I was the teaching assistant along with another colleague for the Diversity in Higher Education class. I was in the class as a freshman the first time that it was taught in Spring 2008. This was the second time that this class was taught at Western and I was hesistant as to whether or not this class was going to be the same as the time that I was in the class which was the first time that this class was taught or completely different. In conclusion, the class was completely different because our teacher chose to take a completely different route by making it a larger class and changing some of the curriculum. The class was not as engaged as both the teacher and I would have liked for it to have been, but along with the negative outcome there was definitely some positive outcomes as well. At the end of the quarter I had to write a final assignment describing the experience that I have had throughout the quarter with the class and the positive or negative outcomes of being a teaching assistant for the class. I learned a lot from this experience about myself as a leader and also myself as a learner.

In the Spring of 2008 I was a part of the Diversity in Higher Education class (SAA 375) and one of our assignments was to put together a poem descibing where you are from. The poems were then read by each student and were merely personal experiences/stories which were marked by humor, emotion, and anger. This was a very incredible experience and I learned a lot from it. After each piece was read each student then gave positive feedback to honor eachothers work which definitely made the class as a whole become more comfortable with eachother . This was definitely one of the most memorable experiences at Western.