The Lumberjack



Students Serving The Cal Poly Humboldt Campus and Community Since 1929

Tag: Learning

  • Online Learning Isn’t for Me

    Online Learning Isn’t for Me

    Online classes don’t feel like real learning and stifle student motivation

    Spring semester has turned into one of the worst semesters of my life, and online classes aren’t helping.

    Don’t get me wrong, online classes are nice to clear up some room in your schedule for work or other classes. They are still classes and shouldn’t be forgotten. I’ve taken at least one—but no more than two—online classes per semester.

    But online classes usually have a set schedule. Something like: discussion posts due Monday, comments due Wednesday and a quiz every Friday, plus a project like an essay or media presentation due at some point in the semester. Online classes that start at the beginning of the semester allow both the professor and students to be prepared for the whole semester.

    Online classes that start in the middle of the semester? Yeah, those aren’t for me. They’re also not what I paid for.

    None of us know what is going on right now and we’re all taking it day by day, but when your professors start to panic, you start to panic. Some professors know what they’re doing and let you know everything right away, while others don’t know what to do or don’t know how to use Zoom or record online lectures.

    It took me a minute to learn how to use Zoom, and although I appreciate the service and enjoy seeing my classmates’ faces, it’s awkward. It’s just a big FaceTime where your professor is trying to make the education worth your money. And just like in an everyday classroom, not everyone talks in the Zoom sessions. Zoom sessions always seem to glitch and are mostly only useful for group discussions, critiques and presentations.

    We’ve all lost motivation, and quite frankly, it doesn’t even feel as if we’re in school anymore.

    I learn better on paper and in person. I realize a lot of work is done on computers and submitted on Canvas, but being in a classroom and taking notes while a professor is lecturing is how something sticks in my head. There are too many distractions at home that I can’t get away from that just make it even harder to learn.

    Social media tells me that a lot of people feel the same way. Even though we get to be home and work at our own pace, most of the time being at home just makes us not want to work.

    We’ve all lost motivation, and quite frankly, it doesn’t even feel as if we’re in school anymore. Having to remind myself is getting pretty annoying.

    With all of this said, I know we should probably be grateful we’re still getting some kind of education. This is my last semester of college, and although I’m not a fan of how it’s ending, I’m grateful I won’t have to take any more online classes.

  • Voices of Student Science

    Voices of Student Science

    By | Kyra Skylark

    Casey Goldberg
    Casey Goldberg, is in her first semester at HSU and is loving her first botany major class. Photo credit: Kyra Skylark

    Casey Goldberg, a freshman in her first semester at HSU is just getting to know the HSU community and campus. Yet, in her first few months of being here Goldberg has made strong connections.

    “I hope to keep the ties that I’ve made with friends, I’ve met a lot of cool people here so far,” said Casey Goldberg.

    As a Botany major Goldberg, appreciates being surround by nature on campus.

    “I really like that in Botany I can go out into the forest and I know exactly what is going on inside that tree or like, I know what kind of bush that is,” said Goldberg. “It’s pretty cool.”

    Kayla Grove
    Kayla Grove is Kinesiology major who hopes to use what she is learning to improve peoples lives. "I just want to give back to the population, to use all the things I've learned about exercise and health promotion and educate people on it," said Grove. Photo credit: Kyra Skylark

    Kayla Grove is studying Kinesiology with an emphasis in Exercise Science and Health Promotion. From Ventura county, Grove was drawn to HSU by the beauty of the campus’s environment.

    “The trees, definitely the nature, I was never exposed to that growing up so I fell in love with it as soon as I visited,” said Kayla Grove.

    In her fourth year at HSU, Grove has taken many classes that have greatly influenced what she wants to do after she graduates.

    “It’s all still coming together for me from each class, I’m just piecing it all together,” said Grove.

    One class that she is currently taking has helped give her an idea of the kind of career she’d like to pursue.

    “Right now I’m taking a Structural Kinesiology class with Justus Ortega, and we’ve been talking a lot about the forces of muscles and the biomechanics of muscles,” said Grove. “I think I’m leaning towards working with older people and that’s what he [Professor Ortega] specializes in too, so he talks about it a lot and how it relates to our field.”

    While it is not always considered the most glamorous of careers within exercise science, working with older individuals is what really speaks to Grove.

    “They’re facing a lot of health problems usually, specifically exercise issues, like they need more exercise in their life and they don’t know how to go about it,” said Grove. “Sometimes they will do something that is too much on their body or not enough for them.”

    Grove wants to teach others to live their lives in a healthy, happy body.

    “I just want to give back to the population, to use all the things I’ve learned about exercise and health promotion and educate people on it,” said Grove. “I want people to live longer healthier lives.”

    Ariel Robinson
    Ariel Robinson a mathematics major has found a community in Humboldt. Photo credit: Kyra Skylark

    Also looking for a change from the environment, as well as the social scene in Southern California, Ariel Robinson is a mathematics major. In her fourth year at HSU, Robinson has gone through many math classes and is working on understanding the smaller intricacies of some subjects.

    “I would really like to be a teacher at a collegiate level so I’m hoping this stuff really sticks with me,” said Ariel Robinson.

    Not only is Robinson learning mathematics, but she is also learning teaching habits from her professors. As a future teacher herself, there are certain things from her own learning that she plans to take with her and use in her own career.

    “I’m really happy with the way I have been treated by a lot of my math professors, they understand that I’m coming at it from a new point of view,” said Robinson. “That’s really one of the things that I’d like to carry on, this sense of understanding that we are all just learning something new, and that we can all help each other to learn something new.”

    The communication and understanding Robinson has experienced in her classes and on campus have made her happy to be an HSU student.

    “A lot of people down south don’t really understand the different struggles people have to go through and are really self centered,” said Robinson. “But up here I feel like it’s more community oriented and people really care about those around them.

    Robinson hopes to carry the sense of community and understanding she found at HSU wherever she goes after graduating.

    “Really just the overall attitude that people have here, that differences are accepted and that anybody can have a chance, that was really the most heartwarming thing when I came up here,” said Robinson.