Rachel Rayborn

Hello! My name is Rachel Rayborn. I am from Park Ridge Illinois, a Chicago suburb. Currently, I am a First Year student at The Ohio State University interested in pursuing a career in middle childhood education. I have always loved working with younger children and would love to be able to have an impact on their lives as they grow, decide who they are, who they want to be, and what they want to pursue in their future.

My top 5 StrengthsQuest Strengths are: Achiever, Consistency, Positivity, Developer, and Learner. Honestly, I’m not really surprised by any of these top 5 strengths, and it does make sense that “Achiever” is my number one strength. The description of the “Achiever” strength says that it often allows someone to work hard and accomplish what they said they would do. People with the “Achiever” strength are often regarded as dependable. They work hard when it comes to acquiring new information as they seek to broaden their knowledge base. They also reflect on themselves and their interactions occasionally as they try to achieve a deeper meaning in their life.

Personally, I can probably be described as having all of these qualities. I work hard in everything that I do and throw myself into my work. When I worked on my homework when I was younger, if something didn’t make complete sense to me, I would literally spend as long as it took to understand it. My parents would want me to go to bed and I would say something along the lines of “But I need to finish this. I don’t understand it yet.” My parents still laugh and tease me because they say while many parents struggle to get kids to work on their schoolwork, they had more difficulty getting me to stop. There were times they physically had to take homework away from me so that they could get me to begin to go to bed; however, that didn’t even always work since I would still be thinking about whatever it was that I wanted to work on. I felt like I needed to achieve understanding.

Now, I might be better at putting things away and telling myself that I can do it tomorrow, but that motivation and hard work has not subsided. I still put hard work into what I do. I think that this mostly influences my academics because I work hard to complete all of my assignments, showing my best possible work. However, this applies to other areas of my life as well, as the description says, I scrutinize and examine how I treated others in certain situations. I put hard work into the relationships that I want to maintain and try to stay close with my friends. I also work on my personal life in order to achieve the best possible version of myself.

Although I am still new to OSU, I have picked up a few tricks from the first semester. You learn a lot in college, both in and out of the classroom, in just the first few weeks. Most advice can apply to any college, not just The Ohio State University, which I would definitely love to share with students who will be going off to college next year and beginning this exciting journey in their life. My advice for anyone going away from home and starting the college process would be:

1. Don’t be afraid to go somewhere far from home. Being on your own isn’t as scary as it seems at first. It helps you gain more independence and responsibility.

2. Keep your mind open to new experiences.

3. Stay organized. You need to stay on top of all of your classes and being organized really helps. No one is going to be there to constantly remind you of upcoming assignments anymore.

4. Don’t be intimidated of campus. Instead, go out of your way to talk to people and try new things. Everyone is feeling the same way as you, and wants someone else to extend a hand. Make friends, experience new things, and take advantage of the offered opportunities. You never know where you might find your place.

5. Have fun. Be yourself, and do what makes you happy. College will be as great as you decide to make it; therefore, make it an amazing experience by doing what makes you happy.

I am sure that in the years to come, I will learn countless more lessons, but for now, these are some of the lessons that I have learned and that have helped me get through the first semester of college. I can’t wait to continue on at The Ohio State University and continue to grow as an individual.

My favorite Ohio State University tradition is singing Carmen Ohiowhich is one of OSU’s most well-known and loved traditions. Carmen Ohiogained popularity after it was published in The Lantern in 1906. The first verse is sung by the football team and the entire crowd after every home football game, win or lose. It is also sung at numerous important events throughout the school year.

I did not know the Carmen Ohio song before coming to OSU; however, it was the first tradition that I was able to truly participate in while here. We sang it with our entire class at Convocation. Carmen Ohiorepresents a bond between any and all OSU students or fans, past and present, that have pasted through the school at