Another SHO TIME has come and gone, and the fall 2009 semester is ready to begin.  Being involved in the first SHO TIME as a freshman and then as a mentor for the past two years, I have experienced all that SHO TIME has to offer.  While SHO TIME is a chance to learn more about the academic requirements and enrichment opportunities of the Schreyer Honors College, SHO TIME serves a much more important role of bringing the honors college community together.  SHO TIME helps break the ice not by spelling your name with your butt nor hiding a mysterious truth amongst two lies but by providing all Schreyer honors scholars with a common experience which they can share and build upon.  SHO TIME 2009 was a great experience for me as a mentor and as a honors scholar, and I can't wait to help out next year.   

At the beginning, everything is difficult. This saying is especially true when deciding what to do during the first week of the fall semester. Here are some of things to look forward to:

SHO TIME - a very busy three day event where the Schreyer Honors College prepares for the beginning of the new school year.  "Late Night with the Dean" (Dean Brady becomes David Letterman), Broomball (kind of like ice hockey with sneakers and 100 people), PLAYFAIR (elementary school gym class activities geared towards having you meet as many people as possible), and the finale.

Fresh START - a community service event geared for freshman.  I am a team mentor for this event.

Involvement Fair - get involved by learning about the various clubs and student organizations

First Late Night - fun, food, and free t-shirts after the President's Convocation in the BJC

Rally in the Valley - learn the Penn State fight songs, get free stuff, and get pumped up for the football season

Any many more - keep your ears and eyes wide open.  You never know what you might find.

One of the books on the SHO TIME 2009 book list that I have read this summer was The Namesake by Jhumpa Lahiri.  The Namesake follows the adventures of Gogol or Nikhil Ganguli from when his family first comes to the United States of America to the day when Gogol's mother moves out of his childhood home.  One of the central themes in the story is the tension that exists between Gogol's hertiage and the social expectations of Gogol in the United States of America.  This conflict is evident early on as it is traditional in a Bengali family to give a child an official birth name that is symbolic and powerful and then later in life give a nickname that reflects the child's true personality in the family.  However, because this type of nomenclature is not a common practice in the United States, Ashoke and Ashima Ganguli name their first son Gogol, which both serves as his birth name and nickname.  The parents named their son Gogol after the famous writer Nikolai Gogol because this writer was his father's favorite and played a significant role when the father was involved in a horrific train crash.

As Gogol grows up, he comes to resent his name and believes that it will hurt his chances with the ladies.  Therefore, he changes his name to Nikolai.  However, I believe that this decision is representative of the entire novel as no matter how hard Gogol tries to leave his hertiage behind him, his hertiage will always define him.  Even though he hated the name of Gogol, he still allowed his hertiage to define him by calling himself by the first name of his father's favorite author instead of the last name.  As a result, The Namesake provoked for me many questions such as what is the relationship between one's hertiage and one's current life - does one define the other or do they both influence each other?

Overall, I enjoyed reading The Namesake.  I found the author's writing style to be very fluid.  At times, I did not feel as though I was reading but that I was watching a movie instead.  In fact, a movie based on The Namesake has been made.  The trailer can be seen below (coming soon):   

When I was in high school, the Schreyer Honors College never factored into my decision to attend the Pennsylvania State University.  I had always wanted to go Penn State ever since my family took trips up to Happy Valley in elementary school.  In high school, I knew Penn State was the right decision for me because of the opportunities it could offer me.  I was never afraid that at Penn State I would just be treated as a number or I would get lost in the sea of 40,000 students.  Penn State was a place of great opportunity.  After learning about the honors college at an information session, I decided to apply in order to increase the number of opportunities available to me at Penn State.

After two years of being in the Schreyer Honors College, the best part about being a Schreyer scholar is the fact that I am also a Penn State student.  The Schreyer Honors College has helped challenge me academically, but Penn State University has helped me grow as a leader and as a person.  At Penn State, I have been able to grow as a leader through becoming the webmaster of Science Lions, a team leader at FreshSTART, and a teaching intern in my college of Information Sciences and Technology.  I have been able to serve the community through participating in various days of service and serving as a committee member for a THON operations committee.  I have been able to experience my favorite sport of volleyball through becoming an assistant manager of the men's volleyball team and playing with my friends in the IM building.

While being a Schreyer scholar has many opportunities such as being able to schedule early and be a part of great events such as SHO TIME, being a Schreyer scholar is even better because we are a part of the Penn State community.  

As an Information Sciences and Technology major, I often have problems finding honors courses specific to my major.  Usually, I honors option the courses in the major to get my honors credit.  However, the best true honors class that I have taken at Penn State is my first ever IST class, IST 110H.

IST 110H, or Information, People, and Technology, was the introductory course into the major for me and was taught by Professor Andrea Tapia.  Dr. Tapia was a great instructor and was very passionate about her work at the College of Information Sciences and Technology.  During the course, I learned about a broad range of Web 2.0 technologies by starting by my own blog (which I still update to this day), investigating social networking technologies, exploring the virtual world of Second Life, and creating a YouTube video for a group project.  My avatar in Second Life shown dancing in the class organized dance party is shown below as well as the YouTube video my group created that was a parody of the funny Celebrity Jeopardy segments on Saturday Night Live:




The reason why IST 110H is the best honors class I have ever taken is because the course proved to me that I had chosen the right major of Information Sciences and Technology.  If ever in the need of a general social and behavioral sciences course, I highly recommend IST 110H. 

In the Schreyer Honors College, there are many opportunities.  One of these opportunities is the orientation program known as SHO TIME.  Last year, I served as a mentor for first year students, and I have volunteered to be a mentor again this year.  Yesterday, the mentors for SHO TIME had a retreat to Beaver Stadium.  The highlight of the retreat was when Icers head coach Joe Battista spoke about "The Margin of Excellence."  His best line was "Excuses are like armpits.  Everyone has them, and they all stink."  Besides the speech, I enjoyed learning about what is in store for SHO TIME 2009 and how we are going to improve the SHO from last year.  SHO TIME 2009 is looking good so far, but honestly, spring break at the end of this week is looking great!

By the way, the highlight video for SHO TIME 2008 has been posted on YouTube.  Check it out below.  You can see someone familar at 0:56 in a blue shirt...