Spring Quarter Reflection

This quarter has been a wild ride. Throughout this quarter, I’ve learned a lot about
myself, grown as a leader, and had a blast whilst doing so.
One thing that has shaped a lot of this growth was the Honors 397 Peer Educator
Seminar class. This class helped me find a lot of the confidence around leadership that I felt like
I had lost with a lot of the pandemic. In high school, pre-pandemic, I was involved in just about
every kind of leadership you could think of, sports captaining, president-ing a club, captaining a
robotics team, etc. When the pandemic hit and We spent so much time inside away from
people, it felt like I lost a lot of the ability to talk to people. This has been so nice because I’ve
gained back so much of that confidence. Prepping for Peer education has helped me realize
that leadership isn’t a platform to achieve. It’s not that I was a leader in high school and am not
now because I’m not in specific roles in x number of clubs. Leadership is about being a good
mentor, it's a day-by-day step-by-step process to improve and be able to communicate and lead
better and better every day. What this class has taught me is that we’re all learning, and this
class itself has been an amazing opportunity to learn.
Honors 397 has also really emphasized for me that leadership is a very constructive
thing, as opposed to an authoritative thing. So often leaders are seen as powerful and bossy,
but this class has shown that leadership is just as much about making everyone feel welcome
and creating a space where everyone is comfortable and wants to be there.
An activity that we did as a part of the retreat we went on really helped with this. The
activity where we separated into quadrants based on our leadership style was a really nice
exercise in finding what we needed to focus on to best instruct and create welcoming
community spaces. It also outlined the strengths of different ways of approaching leadership
and teaching, as well. As said before, leadership is often portrayed as an incredibly authoritative
thing, when in reality there are so many different aspects of leadership that are more than giving
directions. This exercise helped open my mind to valuing these different ways of being.
Reflecting on this exercise has also helped me in my everyday life. Because of this exercise, I
know to work on being more assertive and rational in my decisions, which I have tried to
incorporate into clubs and group projects outside of Honors 397. I have worked this knowledge
into my lesson plans, too, structuring lessons according to strengths and weaknesses learned
during the exercise.
Honors 397 has also been so helpful in accepting my academic self. In this class, we
discuss often fears of not being enough academically and urges to constantly compare
accomplishments to the accomplishments of others. I have felt a lot of this at UW, and having
these frank discussions about this difficulty has been constructive. Learning that everyone else
struggles with the same issues has helped me contextualize these worries, acknowledge them,
and dismiss them. In other words, Honors 397 has allowed me to work through some of the
anxieties I have around academics and comparing success. This work will in turn let me better
pass on that knowledge and help my students tackle those feelings in the fall too, and will help
me in talking to anyone else who is feeling those same feelings.
Finally, has just been an amazing quarter of getting to know everyone! Honors 397 has
been a truly amazing experience, and finding community within the 2022 peer educator cohort
has been a priceless experience. I won’t forget the memories made on the retreat and in class
together.
I also learned a lot through my other classes and clubs this quarter.
I learned new study strategies through ESRM 250. At the end of the quarter, when
working on my map, I learned quickly that I needed to work on it at least a bit every day to get it
done on time. This is a strategy I’ve been slowly working on throughout my time at UW, but it is
a strategy that really shone with this class.
I also learned that it’s ok to step back through dropping Stats. I have had so much
academic insecurity throughout basically all my life. I’ve told myself over and over that it’s not ok
to fail at anything academically or else all of me is a failure. Dropping Stats helped me prove
that voice wrong, helped me prove to myself that it is ok to take a break and ask for help and
that it doesn’t make me any less me.
Above all, this quarter I had the most fun during school that I have had in a long time. I
found my people, found classes and majors I really am interested in, and have worked towards
healthier and more productive ways of studying.
Spring Quarter of 2022 has been my happiest time yet at UW, and I can’t wait for it to get
happier.