Get Your CALS BEAT Shirt!

            Are you hoping to get the most out of your four short years as a student at UF? If you are, joining the UF Alumni Association (UFAA) as a student member is an excellent way to get started. The UFAA is an alumni organization for present and past Gators that provides members with special benefits and services. The Alumni Association offers discounts for members to places such as Cloud 9 Spa, Kaplan Test Prep, Disney, just about every restaurant in Gainesville, and many other businesses! The UFAA also helps with career development by offering information on posting and searching for jobs, career seminars, continuing education resources, and networking opportunities. Another incentive of being a UFAA member is access to special alumni events. These include exclusive tailgates, Black Alumni Weekend, and other alumni reunions. As a member you are also given the opportunity to join Gator Clubs, affiliated organizations of the UFAA that support the goals of the organization. Signing up to be a UFAA member automatically grants you membership to your local Gator Club.

            Still not sold on becoming a member of the Alumni Association? Well you haven’t learned about the perks of being a student member yet! Student members are offered all the same benefits as alumni members and more. Student members receive special Gator swag like a drawstring backpack, sunglasses, and a water bottle just to name a few. One of my very favorite parts of being a student member of the UFAA is getting BEAT shirts for upcoming football games. Student members are given the opportunity to become a Tradition Keeper by keeping track of specific Gator traditions (painting the 34^th St wall, visiting the bat house, taking a picture with the Bull Gator, etc) you complete during your time at UF. Aside from the fun experience of completing these traditions, members are also given a medal to wear at graduation for completing a certain number of traditions. Student members are also eligible to apply to be a Cicerone, an official student ambassador of the University of Florida. You can sign up to be a student member online or at Emerson Alumni Hall for the small price of $20 a year or $70 for your entire UF career. Given all of the perks of being a student member, this truly is a great deal!

            A very special alumni association event is taking place THIS WEDNESDAY, October 30^th at 10:00 am! Students of the College of Agricultural and Life Sciences (CALS) have the opportunity to receive a coveted CALS BEAT shirt – a special BEAT shirt created exclusively for our college! To receive a shirt, you will have to be a member of the UFAA. If you haven’t signed up yet, you can complete registration Wednesday morning where the shirts are being distributed. Speaking of which, you can pick up your BEAT shirt on the northeast side of McCarty D. These shirts will be distributed on a first come first serve basis, so arrive early! If you are not already a student member of the UFAA, now is the perfect time to begin your legacy as a Gator!

Go Gators and BEAT Georgia!

- Kaley Mialki

Life Lessons from Traveling Abroad

Oi!

My name is Ana Luiza Fraisse, and I am a senior environmental science major. This is my final semester at the University of Florida and I’m sad it’s almost over. I’ve had many wonderful experiences as a student in the College of Agricultural and Life Sciences. One of my favorite experiences was my opportunity to live, study, and work in Porto Alegre, Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil.

Although my family is from Brazil and I get to spend my summers visiting family and friends there, my study abroad program took place in a region of Brazil that I didn’t know and allowed me to study in one of the best universities in the nation. This experience was important to me because it was my first time living away from home and being truly independent. It also led me to understand more about my heritage and the unique individual that I am.

I made friends from countries all around the world and even learned a few life lessons. Some of these include, but are not limited to:

1. Don’t lend your cell phone to strangers in cafés – you may not get it back.
2. Always cross the street at the indicated crosswalks – otherwise you might get hit by a motorcycle.
3. The best way to get to know a city is by walking through it – you get to experience the culture up close and not from behind a glass.
4. Sometimes getting lost will help you find a place you wouldn’t have gotten a chance to explore otherwise.
5. Just because you can speak the language, doesn’t mean you can write well.

I was fortunate enough to work as a server in a restaurant in town. I loved being able to feel like I was a part of the city and not just a short-term visitor. I was already fluent in Portuguese but my actions and the way I think aren’t always as “Brazilian” as I previously thought. I made it my goal every night to finish a shift without getting asked where I was from.  I was also able to travel within Brazil, Argentina, and Uruguay. These trips were relaxing, full of culture, and good food. I went with wonderful friends and I’m glad I’ll be able to keep those memories and the memories I made in Porto Alegre with me for years to come.

I encourage all of you to embark on a study abroad journey. Many programs give college credit and you’ll be able to explore different cultures and you may even learn a few things about yourself while you’re there! For more information, please check out http://cals.ufl.edu/global-gators/index.php.

GO GATORS!

Beijos,
Ana Luiza

3 Tips to Get You Through Mid-Terms

What do long lines at Starbucks, late night fourth meals at any open restaurant, and Pinterest breaks have in common? From what I have seen at my time here at the University of Florida, they all are signals that students are preparing to study for mid-terms. I am going to share a few of my secrets for preparing for mid-terms.

1.     Have your priorities in order

The most important thing to remember when beginning to prepare for mid-terms is set your priorities. By knowing what is of the highest importance you can set an order to your daily activities. One thing that I utilize is something taught to me when I first entered college; the MSN system. Must do, Should do and Nice to do. For me, must do tasks are items that need immediate attention, should do deals with me getting ahead for classes and nice to do covers tasks that are not urgent. It is important to set a standard for each of these or you may begin to categorize you N’s as M’s. I know that I can become stressed out easily when it comes to studying, so taking a break every now and again is a must do for me. Taking breaks helps to keep you fresh and energized. But trust me, an hour long Pinterest break is not going to help you remember how to go about finding the risk free rate when you are valuing a stock. A five to ten minute break is a must do; an hour long break is definitely a nice to do. Prioritization leads right into my next tip.

2.     Time management

Managing time is a surefire way to make sure that you are staying productive during the day. Prioritizing your tasks helps to make sure you do the most important things first, but planning out the day can help you to get more accomplished. Desk calendars are amazing. I am not talking about the cute little calendars with the puppies on the cover. I am talking about the big, pasty white, two foot by three foot calendars that is actually too big for your desk altogether. I have one that I use and without it, my life would be chaos. We as students aren’t just taking classes. As for myself, I am in numerous other organizations in which I serve on the executive board and I have a part-time internship with Gainesville Regional Utilities. How you want to organize the calendar is up to you. You can go into a lot of detail by planning out each hour or use blocks of time. I had the ingenious idea to color code my calendar at the beginning of the year… now it looks like it just participated in the color run.

3.     Stress management

My last tip is to manage your stress level. College life, in general, tends to be very stressful and at times even frustrating.  The feeling of being overwhelmed is enough to drive any student to the brink of insanity. Understanding what stresses you out is the first step in knowing how to deal with it. There are many different ways to deal with stress; listening to music, exercising, meditation, or setting aside some time for your favorite hobby are all common ways to manage stress. The Counseling and Wellness Center, Student Health Care Center, and GatorWell are all good resources available on campus if you need additional help in managing stress. They have counselors who will sit down and talk with you about anything and everything. They also offer fun activities during exams like free massages and sometimes they bring in animals for students to play with as another way to relieve stress.

While these are a few things that I do and utilize to prepare for exams, there are many other techniques and options out there. As a student graduating in December, (HOORAY!), I figured I must be doing something right, so why not share my secrets. J Hopefully what I have shared will help you get though mid-terms and even finals.

Study hard (but not too hard) and GO GATORS!

- Deirdre Hilliard

“If a person studies too much and exhausts his reflective powers, he will be confused, and will not be able to apprehend even that which had been within the power of his apprehension.”

-Maimonides

It's great to be a CALS Gator!

            Hi, I’m Amy Emery.  I am majoring in Family, Youth, and Community Sciences with minors in Nonprofit Organizational Leadership and in Disabilities in Society. Over the last year, I have had the opportunity to become a part of the Gator Football Recruitment team, the FYCS Club, and Campus Crusade. Between classes, CALS Ambassador activities, and all of the new clubs and organizations I have joined, I’m staying really busy and loving every minute of it!

            This past weekend the College of Agricultural and Life Sciences had our annual TailGATOR event right before the 7:00 Florida vs. Arkansas kickoff.  It is a college event for current students, family, friends, and alumni.  More than 700 people come to TailGATOR each fall to celebrate their connections to IFAS and CALS.  TailGATOR is by far one of my favorite events of the year and this year was no exception!  At TailGATOR there are many booths set up for different CALS’s clubs and programs. This year, I got to hold a baby pig, touch a baby alligator, get my face painted, eat Hill's Barbecue (which I LOVE), and I got to spend time with some of my friends and meet a lot of new, friendly faces that are all connected to CALS. It was so much fun!

            To top it all off, the day ended with a Gator victory with UF whipping Arkansas 30 to 10!  If you know me, you know I am a huge football fan!  I love every aspect of the sport - watching the games, the coaches, the players, the environment, just everything!  During the home football games I get the pleasure of spending time with football recruits and sitting in the south end zone.  It is such a great time and such an honor to get to know everyone and to see a little of what goes on behind the scenes.

            Between TailGATOR and Gator Football, life is perfect!! I am so proud to be a student at UF, a representative of CALS, and a part of the great Gator Nation. “It’s great to be a Florida Gator!”

- Amy Emery