Honors Launch Learning Community
August 2020 - May 2021

My freshman year on campus at Minnesota State University, Mankato, I was lost and had no clue what to do, so I enrolled in the honors launch learning community. This learning community was a small group of first year honors students, led by an older member of the honors student body. We participated in weekly study groups and activities to get to know each other and find our footing here on campus. I was able to make a few friends through the learning community that I have managed to keep going into my sophomore year, and I was also given an outlet to ask questions should I have any more about the school or the honors program in the future.

 

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This experience helped me learn about the honors program, its competencies, and ways to develop myself and my leadership skills. As always, there are things that went well and things that did not go so well. One thing that went well was that I met many people, a few people even became friends after the learning community went our separate ways. A thing that did not go so well is I also was expected to go to meetings and events throughout the week for which I did not always have time. This actually taught me how to manage my time better and that it is okay to take a step back from the groups you are involved in to focus on your studies because those are what are important. The activities and meetings are a big part of the learning community. They can help students remain accountable by having someone check in on them each week, and it can also help students by building a group or community that they can turn to in their time of need. Specifically, this community helped me build a presence in the honor’s program at MNSU and build relationships that have helped me be successful while in school. The experiences and little field trips that the community went on is the best way I can think of to build the relationships to help someone succeed. I believe that this will help me inside college to search for the opportunities that I had lacked my freshman year as well as opportunities to better myself and those around me.

 

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Examples of things that I learned while in this group are that you need to be able to find your people and have many of them in your corner. Through the group I was able to find three people to keep in my corner and a person or two I should cut out of my corner. I can confidently say that I know who I should trust and who I should not. This is actually opposite of what I believed growing up. I always thought that people should always be seen as a great person until they prove otherwise. Unfortunately, I know that people will not always prove that they are the best. I have had many experiences that forced me to confront this fact. Two of these experiences came in college, and they have shaped me as well as the positive relationships that I have forged as well. This also helped me develop my communication skills while transitioning into a new environment. I am from a small town in Iowa named Le Mars and transitioning to a bigger city in a different state was difficult for me. The learning community served as a great conduit for me in my transitioning phase of freshman year.

 

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As for the future, I would like to grow my leadership competency by continuing to find leadership experiences in the world and particularly in my major or minors. Not only will more leadership experiences help boost a resume, but they will also help me understand the situation I am in. If this experience has taught me anything it is that leadership experiences not only help you, but they help those around you by giving them someone to look up to while also providing them with someone who knows the path they have taken and the best ways to approach a new position.