Hello, my name is Sarah Oliver and I am currently a freshman at St. Norbert College. I graduated from Wrightstown High School in 2007, and immediately decided to enroll in the new partnership between St. Norbert and Bellin College of Nursing program. I have two younger brothers, 8 and 10, and an older brother and sister. I enjoy playing soccer and was a member of the girl’s varsity soccer team at Wrightstown. I also enjoy reading, studying, scrapbooking, swimming, and rollerblading. During the summer I am also employed as a lifeguard and a swimming instructor. I hope that you all enjoy following me through this new program here at St. Norbert College.

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Archives for: August 2008

Start of Sophomore Year!

08/26/08 at 02:38:27 pm

Hello Everyone!

Wow, what a summer it was! I can honestly say I feel as if May was just yesterday and now it’s already the end of August and I’m back at St. Norbert to begin my second year of college. It’s kind of depressing and exciting all wrapped in one. Depressing as in the time is going way to fast, but exciting in the sense that this year I get to devour more into my major specific classes, which of course is nursing

This year I can already tell I am going t have my hands full! My class at St. Norbert started today, however my classes at Bellin do not start until next week after the holiday weekend. At St. Norbert I am taking Philosophy 302 (philosophy of consciousness) with Dr. Abel. I am super excited for the class because one: the class size consists of only 5 people so it’s very personable and discussion is always of an interesting topic, and two: because Dr. Abel is the professor…who by the way is probably one of the better philosophy professors there are here at St. Norbert. So needless to say, this week is actually quite boring for me because I only have to be at class on Tuesday from 11-1 and Thursday from 1-3. Then on Wednesday I have my orientation at Bellin from 7:30-3, so that could be a good time. Next week, however, all chaos I’m sure is going to break loose.

At Bellin this year I have four classes, two labs, and then a clinical on the 4th unit of Bellin Hospital which begins in November. Yeah, I know, that’s a lot! On Monday’s I have Fundamentals of Nursing Care and Nutrition for Nursing from 8-1:30. Then on Wednesday I have my Health Assessment class from 8-10:30 and lab from 4:15-5:45. Thursday I have another lab from 4-7 at night, and finally to wrap up my week I have Pathophysiology from 8:30-10:30. Yeah, it’s kind of a crazy schedule and I would like to personally take the time to thank the person who created the calendar and personal planners because I know I will be utilizing them both this semester and next! Then to just put the icing on the cake, I also have my RA duties to attend to! Things kind of got messed up this year due to the shortage of housing, so I basically live in an all guys dorm with the exception of the 17 girls I have on my floor on the garden level of Burke Hall. Otherwise, floors 2-4 house all freshman guys and a few upper classmen in some of the rooms. It kind of has its advantages and disadvantages, but I would have to say for the most part the disadvantages outnumber the advantages. However, I am just trying to make the best of it and so far it hasn’t been horrible…although we have only spent one weekend here so we’ll see how the rest of the semester progresses! But on the bright side, I love the RA staff that we have in the building this year, even though I am the only female, but we still have a ton of fun!

Because I am a RA I have been super busy over the last two weeks! I moved back to school on August 12th to begin training for my RA position. We had many different training sessions we had to sit in on, and then we went to Camp U-Ni-Li-Yah (which is a YMCA owned camp in Mountain, WI) not this past weekend but the weekend before for more training and leadership building. That, by far, was the highlight of the RA training! Then once we got back from that it was just constantly on the go from about 8 in the morning until about 10 or later at night. There were many nights of only getting about 4 hours of sleep and no time for nap during the day. Thursday we moved in all the freshman, and then if that wasn’t exhausting enough Friday came and then it was time to move the upper classman back in. Saturday finally came and I think all of us just slept pretty much the entire morning! And then Saturday night was spent catching up with all the friends that we haven’t seen since May 9th. It was sooo nice to be able to see everyone again and catch up on the events of the summer! Sunday of course was Freshman Convocation followed by a campus wide cookout and a live band. This is always a lot of fun because pretty much the entire college campus body attends so once again it’s a time for you to catch up with the friends you haven’t seen in three months. And of course the band was amazing as always and the fireworks bring an end to the night and a kickoff to another academic year.

Other than that, not too much has been going on with me. Just trying to catch up the sleep I missed out on the past two weeks and gearing up for yet another semester of college! Hope all is well and talk to you soon!

Sarah