After almost two years working this job, I found my fear of math was gone. I wanted to help others see that they too could do better than they thought they could at math, just as I had done, so I decided to go back to school at University and major in mathematics. I liked most of my classes in the applied mathematics major, but I started having trouble near the end when I had to take mathematics involving proofs. I did not understand the logic behind proof mathematics, and I feared I would not be able to graduate because of this. I had everything done for my degree but four classes, so a friend recommended I look into the General Studies major. After the information session, I decided to apply for General Studies and thought it would be a better fit since I no longer wanted to pursue becoming a mathematics professor. I found that I only needed two classes to complete the General Studies degree and that I would be done by summer session I. 
I think the General Studies degree is appropriate for me since I now want to be an academic advisor and this degree covers a broad range of academia. Because I was not a General Studies major until this semester, I didn’t have any classes geared towards that specifically. However, as a transfer student, I had time every semester to take classes beyond my previous major. I took classes in psychology, education, anthropology, the arts, and other disciplines because I thought they would be fun to take, and it turned out this decision will lead me to graduating on time. I am glad that I rounded out my experiences in college, and it worked out for the best, even if I didn’t realize it would at the time.  It may have taken ten years to get my bachelors, but everything I did on the way was important. 

If I could only summarize my education into one sentence, I would have to say my time at IU has made me able to adapt to any situation I may encounter. Throughout my years in college I have been able to take classes in the major disciplines, from science and mathematics to arts and humanities. I have taken a variety of different things, and each of them has given me a chance to see people and the world through a different lens. I am flexible in my way of thinking about new things, and things different from me, because of my liberal arts education.
My first anthropology class relayed to me how humans had to adapt to their environment to survive. I learned early humans were even more reliant on their nearby environment then we are today. For most of our history, we depended on nature to put plants and animals nearby so we could eat, and we had little more than spears to acquire food and keep us going. The relationship between people and the physical world is still very important, because how we survived then guided us to our cultures and what we do with resources in the world now. This anthropology class taught me the physical world shaped us into the people we are now, and that the environment we live in shapes our cultural ideas and ways of life.
