The Start of Junior Year

I have been at school for 5 weeks already and it has been difficult to find a good time to update everyone on my life but now is as good of a time as any. I am majoring in actuarial science now and I am enjoying it. Pure science was not my calling and I need to embrace and acknowledge my strengths. Tough times lie ahead but from what I hear actuaries tend to enjoy what they do. So let me begin by telling you the classes that I am taking this semester. I am taking Financial Accounting, Macroeconomics, Business Law, Organizational Behavior, and Calculus 3. I am enjoying all of these classes although they are certainly keeping me very busy.

Financial Accounting: I am impressed by the elegant system that makes up a financial statement. It is very important to know how to classify transactions. It requires good organization. There is a lot of analysis and interpretation that goes into it. My professor was a public accountant for 33 years. I am having my first exam in this class next week and I hope that it goes well. It has really helped me to understand how businesses classify their financial transactions better.

Macroeconomics: Economics is an interesting subject studied by curious people who make assumptions and enjoy asking questions. The material is enjoyable but quite basic. This is as good of a time as any to study this subject because of everybody going on in the US and the world. My teacher is enthusiastic about his subject and a very nice guy. The workload is not too bad and it has shed light on a lot of what policy-makers have been doing.

Business Law: This is a very new class where so many concepts are foreign. My professor has done a good job of distilling it down and making it interesting. He expects us to read a lot and to think logically. It is a different kind of logic from mathematics and one that will take some getting used to. It is insane how many different things a person can be sued for.

Organizational Behavior: One thing that I have wanted to do in college is take a few psychology classes before I graduate. I am curious to learn what this field is about since I enjoy chatting and meeting people. Well, this is a class with some psychology grounded into it. It has been interesting to learn all of the elements that are necessary to successfully manage an organization. I have learned a lot about different categories that are used to determine efficacy in managing people and working with others.

Calculus 3: This is a class that will be important to my major. There are some actuarial exams that require a good grasp of calculus. So far I have understood most of what has been presented. It has been nice to learn this material because it has an important basis in a lot of real-world applications. I am anticipating that it will get a lot more challenging and I am hoping that everything will click because I truly enjoy how conceptually rich this subject is.

Remembering 9/11

Twelve days ago it was the ten year anniversary of 9/11. 9/11 is still fresh on our minds and almost all of us remember what we were doing that day when it happened. Our thoughts and prayers go out to everybody that was affected by 9/11.

I still remember that day. I didn't hear about it until I got to school that day. I was in the fifth grade. My teacher asked us how we were and if we had heard what had happened. All of us did not. And then she turned on the t.v. and we saw. It was horrifying and sickening and my classmates and I will not forget what we saw. It was heartbreaking to see and it changed all of us forever.

So ten years later, it still impacts how we think and how we live. May those who were injured or killed that day not be forgotten.