Essay 1

It was a beautiful day in late August, kind of warm and very nervewracking for me. Because I was embarking on the most important day in my life, the beginning of my college experience. The day began with its normal rituals and everything appeared to be fine until I arrived at the college. Suddenly I found myself asking, what am I doing here? Am I really ready for this. I wanted to cry, but I pushed back the tears and plunged onward. Before I knew it, I was pushed amoungst the hustle and bustle of the first day.

I must have looked like a child whoe teddy bear was taken from him.

Being as how I was truely frightened I desparately tried to find my first class and with the aide of a few older students I successfully found my place.

After that things got easier, but not to. The hardest part was yet to come. The adjustment to new and different people. The biggest difficulty was starting a conversation. Most of the time you say nothing for the fear of sounding dumb. The first time beginning to talk to someone, my voice cracks and I must have turned scarlet red, but I never stuck around to find out. I ducked out quicly and found the nearest lady’s room.

The strange thing about college is its professors. Each has its own technique but the same basics. One the first day they each tell you what they expect during the semester and then they hand you a forty page syllabus of work to be done in fifteen weeks. I had another who when every time she spoke sounded like she was having her hand for dinner.

People asked me what I thought about my first year in school. My response is simply, “It was different”.

Essay 2 Humankind can’t continue their lives without desires. If one wants to be happy, surely, he has to discover his best desires that provide him a happy life. Some of these desires that help to continue our lives can be acceptance in our relationships, a good family life and strong social relations. Trying to satisfy these desires has a great meaning to achieve happiness for me. To start with, however embarrassed I am about this desire of mine, I have an obsession to expect people to accept my thoughts and manners in every situation. Yes, this is not a good characteristic and sometimes makes me an antipathic person but trying to be accepted by someone can give you happiness, too. Besides, if you can manage to make someone love you knowing and accepting all about you, I think that is the absolute happiness. Furthermore, it seems to me that family is the basic source of happiness. Certainly, I can’t always be a good guy and sometimes I make them upset but I can’t stand seeing them upset. Therefore, I try to do whatever necessary to make them happy. Consequently, when I see happy family faces, I feel deeply happy. Thirdly, to have friends is one of the most meaningful aspects of life. I believe that one should have three very warm friends at least. For example, I can’t bear loneliness and if I couldn’t share all my heart with these warm friends, I believe that I could never be happy. As a consequence, if you feel like me, it will be worth improving your close relationships in order to be happy. To recap, humankind has a short life but he is given a lot of desires to be happy. Moreover, if one wants to discover the meaning of his short life, he should look for it in desires. Whether he finds it or not, he will taste happiness just by looking for it.

 Essay 3

The seperation of community in society is determined by a person social or economic status. Nowadays, a person can choose the society or community they thought suits their life styles. Community now and then changed drastically because of individualism. People tend to think of their happiness before others.

In the essay, "The Community as Commodity," Robert B. Reich, illustrated that the modern community tends to have a wide variety of choice wherein a person can choose according to their economic status. People who are financially stables tend to have more choices and they tend to think of themselves rather than others and people who are not financially stable have limited choices on "the community" they wanted. Those people whose financially stable doesn't want to help other people.

 In connection to Robert B. Reich, "The Community as Commodity," Philip Slater's "Engagement & Detachment: Getting Involved" Slater emphasize that the Americans avoid confronting chronic social problems wherein he is showing that American think of themselves before others.

Essay 4

Most people want to get married and have children. Perhaps they want to leave a trace or offspring after them, so that they become somehow “immortal”. And it is commonly said that children are the ultimate bliss in our lives. Although many people agree with this statement, to my mind, it is not true.

Firstly, it is always claimed that having children brings happiness and meaning to one’s life. To raise them well becomes an ideal for parents. However, I think that although this may be true, children are also a financial and psychological burden for parents. To have children is to have responsibility. Parents spend all their time and money on their children, for their education, clothing and other needs, and do not have much time or money left for themselves.

Secondly, many people assert that it is in human nature to procreate and to see a part of them continue to live. However, I do not believe that it is necessarily instinctive. There are a lot of people who do not have any children and they do not have a tendency to see a part of them continue to live. I think having children for this reason is very old-fashioned. We can have other accomplishments in life for our name or fame continue.

Finally, it is commonly stated that children are our insurance for our old age and that when we get older they will take care of us. Although there are many people who think so, I believe that they are no guarantee against loneliness in old age. Usually children, whether they are married or not, leave their homes. Besides, it is very selfish to have children for insurance. If you have a child, you have to accept the fact that he/she is also an individual and has his/her own needs, and will eventually have his/her own life separate from yours.

To sum up, for most people it might be the biggest happiness to have children. However, I firmly believe that to have children is not everything in life. People can also live full and accomplished lives without children.

Essay 5

As students we all were challenged to do our best. During all our lives we have been labeled with our grades, in high school, the ones with low grades were left alone in misery, when the ones with higher grades were preised as the leaders of this horse race. Then, the question that come into mind is: is it ok to categorize students and if does grading contribute to education?

It is said in the philosophy of the current educational system that grading encourages learning and without grading students would not study. That is far from being real and expresses also another flaw of our education system. The system is basing on fear: the basic reason for students to study is being afraid of low grades. More because the grades are the main criterion for passing courses, students do not study: they just develop methods of cheating. In this way without learning, they pass.

So if grades received in exams are more important than learning the object, all students have to do to pass their courses is memorize how a specific problem is resolved. They don’t know why such method is used, so students cannot apply their ability to resolve the problem to daily life. Still, they pass exams without having knowledge why, how or what of the matter.

Another disadvantage of grading is that grades of a student are not evoluating. That means the grades of a student for the first year of school will still be the same as in the last year, when his knowledge about the subject has got more better or worse. Considering all factors that affect a student’s exams and marks, even, a small incident can have a great impact in the course of time.

Apart from these problems which can be virtually solved by optimizing and improving the grading system, the most important defect of the system cannot be repaired without changing the whole system. The grading system cause inequalitie, superior-inferior relations, classifications and even conflicts. It may be said that societies of the modern world are structured on these basics principles, but the fact that something exists does not explain it. Moreover, the people grown ups in such an education system will not be able to see the other side of the wall, or will be afraid even to look glimpse.

So, my opinion is that grading students is not a good and must be abolished. It is clear that education, namely education during childhood, has a great effect on one’s life. And if you bring the children up in conditions of conflict and competition, they will look for conflicts in the future too.