Persisting in STEM

 Hello friends, I have a great question that I am going to try and answer from my perspective and with everything I've learned so far.

 How do we persist in STEM despite the obstacles and challenges? 

Despite the fact that I had almost no role models in STEM growing up, I let my curiosity guide me, and honestly it hasn't failed me yet. I think it is also important to let go of the indoctrination of everything needs to be perfect and failures are to be avoided at all cost. Let's be realistic, nothing is perfect! you can exist in STEM and not be perfect, really you can exist period and not be perfect, because no one and nothing is perfect. I actually find peace and beauty in that, and I hope you will too. We can not truly learn without failures! It is actually a natural progression of learning. Some could argue that we learn better from seeing the failures, the 'what not to do'. If you are always afraid to fail you will never grow outside of your existing knowledge that was build on failures you experienced as a young person, before the world told you you had to be perfect and failure was now something to avoid at all cost. Go grow, be yourself and make mistakes and learn form those failures like nature intended! In the famous words of one of my favorite teachers and STEM role models - Take chances, make mistakes, and get messy!

https://hero.fandom.com/wiki/Ms._Valerie_Frizzle?file=Mrs._Frizzle.png

Looking Up

 I had an interesting question brought to me today. Did you have any role models that influenced your educational path? 

Unfortunately, I didn’t have any personal role models. I mostly had people in my life that showed me who I didn’t want to be or what I didn’t want to do. When I think of what brought me to a STEM education and career I think of TV shows. Sesame Street, Barney, more influential was Bill Nye The Science Guy, The Magic School Bus and any nature documentary on PBS. PBS really caught my attention and brought me into the world of science. I still watch PBS Docs like Nature, Nova, Secrets of the Dead, and Finding Your Roots. It meant so much to me, that I have been a monthly donor for some time now. My hope is that others get exposed to STEM and new experiences outside of their bubble like I did. 

Challenges...

 When I think about how far I have come since I first created this blog I think if all the challenges that brought me here. I think about how hard coding still is for me and all the times I have been asked why don't I just switch majors? But why would I do that? Just because coding is hard for me, does not mean I'll never get it. In fact, I think the challenge coding brings me is what keeps me pushing to earn this degree and become proficient in it. There were times when I wanted to give up, but I knew I couldn't. This is the Growth Mindset! We need to know that we may fail but that is the process and the only real way to learn. When we give up, we really learn nothing. If you struggle with change or challenges then I recommend Dr. Carol Dweck, she has great TED talks on the growth mindset that can be found on YouTube. Thanks for reading and I hope your semester is off to a great start!

Experience

 We have been going over how to translate our academic experience or our past job experience into desirable skills/traits that a future employer is looking for. When I think of my experience so far one of the first thing that comes to mind is Leadership. I have gained leadership skills by being a mother, it’s literally my job to lead my kids but I have also gained leadership skills from working on several research projects two of which I have been the lead on. I also have the desirable skill of being able to work with a team. The research experience has helped here but also most of my classes have group projects and homework. Furthermore I was very active in campus clubs at my CC so I am comfortable working in a large or small teams. Anther important skill I have is I am capable of working on my own, at times I prefer it. I love being self sufficient but I am not afraid to ask for help. I am an amazing communicator. In fact I could not be efficient in all the other areas without great communications skills. Don’t forget to emphasize your soft skills my friends, these are extremely important. 

How I think I want to use my degree and why

 Hello friends! I have an interesting prompt this week. How do I want to use my degree and why. Well this is a multilayered question because I want to use my degree to propel me into grad school. I also want to use my degree to get my foot in the door of potential internships in the area of cybersecurity. I have learned that I am not a big fan of the Applied computing area of my degree but I'm extremely interested in the Cybersecurity focus that comes with my degree. And that is why I will go to graduate school, so I can earn my masters degree in the field of Cybersecurity.  Eventually I will use my masters degree to hopefully secure critical infrastructure. Furthermore, I hope to use my masters degree and experience to earn a PhD. We will see where this road takes me. Stay well my friends and enjoy Halloween 🎃

Update on my online presence

 Hello friends, well here it is https://mrodriq6.wixsite.com/website. My website! It’s not that exciting but I can always update it and change it as I please. Now that we have had several classes and assignments about our online presence I can say mine is better after it all. The website makes such a huge difference in helping me stand out. With a name like mine, I get lost in the crowd on the web. I didn’t add any new social media accounts because between FB and LinkedIn I find it would be counterproductive and I truly feel that my personal website does far more than SM. I think anyone looking for a job or trying to get in a school or special program should make a personal website, highlight yourself and stand out from the crowd. It was free on Wix! And easy, definitely worth a try.

My online presence?

 Hello everyone! Nice to be back and entering my senior year. recently we (in class) have been discussing our online presence and after evaluating mine, I have to admit that it is pretty weak. I currently use Facebook for personal reasons. I love sharing memes, political posts, pictures, and just my random thoughts and opinions. I use LinkedIn in a whole different way. LinkedIn is much more professional for me. I network by adding, searching, and following different companies and influential people in Cybersecurity. I don’t share anything personal there, just my academics and relevant experiences. I have to say that just between those two SM sites I’m exhausted, I’m not sure I could juggle more than those two but it is worth a try. For our TRAin class we will be building a personal website. I will definitely keep you guys updated and share the link when it’s ready. TTYS