User:Upikehess

Who I Am
When it comes to talking about myself, I don’t really know where to start. For my family and friends I am an open book. I was born February 21st 1994 in Louisville Kentucky to my wonderful mom Kendra Flannigan and my father Kamahl Hess Sr. Many say that I might as well been born with a baseball in my hand. If anyone knows me, they know that I value family, school and baseball, in that order. Let’s talk about those three aspects of my life, after all, each one made me who I am today.

My Family
When it comes to family, we may at sometimes think that our family in particular is probably the craziest family. And that’s exactly what I think of mine but I love them unconditionally, even though they are crazy. My immediate family is made up of my mother Kendra, my step dad Demetrius and my little brother Kobi. My mother has had a huge impact on my life. I am definitely a “momma’s boy.” My mother raised me to be the respectable, dream chasing young man I am today. We have our ups and downs just like any other mother and son relationship but I wouldn’t trade her for anything in the world. I can honestly say that I think I have the worlds’ smartest little brother. He’s always quoting stuff from books and correcting me when I speak. I act like it’s irritating but deep down I love every minute of it. He makes me so proud. My step father Demetrius is also a big part of my life. He never sugar coats things when we talk and I appreciate that and the fact that he helps support my mom and my little brother while I’m away in college makes me love him even more. But there is one more person in my life that I think the world of, and that is my uncle Tahj. Although he is a bit older than me, he remembers what it was like to be a twenty year old young man and when I talk to him, we relate to each other. He shows me that in order to make something of myself, I have to get up and be productive. He is somebody I can come to and talk to about anything and I know for a fact that he won’t pass judgment. I think I keep him young.

== Choosing a School == School for me has always been an important part of my life. When it comes to school I was the guy that did his homework way before it was due and had it revised by my mother before I turned it in. Early on in my childhood my mother instilled in me that education would take me further than I had ever dreamed. So in high school I buckled down and did what I had to do to make good grades and get noticed by colleges. I originally wanted to go to the University of Louisville, but that didn’t work out so I came to the University of Pikeville to earn a Bachelor’s Degree in Criminal Justice and a minor in Business and to play America’s favorite past time sport, baseball! But in college as expected, I have ran into difficulties. I hate taking tests, I can do better on projects or papers than I can on a test. In high school I didn’t necessarily have to study for a test and when I took the test I still passed it with flying colors, but that habit was soon broken when I came to college. Here I am making grades that I’m not used to making but it’s ok, I have adapted to my classes and have made a study routine. After all, I don’t want a degree that I don’t have to work hard for.

My Life
My life has been surrounded by baseball. I have been playing baseball for almost my whole life. I love it. I get a rush when I swing my bat and bring my team mates to home plate. Everyone has to have an outlet, something that relieves stress and brings them internal satisfaction and my outlet is baseball. When I was younger, I had a dream like many young men to be a professional athlete and play in the MLB. My favorite baseball player growing up was Dustin Pedroia, who currently plays second base for the Boston Red Sox, making roughly eight million dollars. He was my true inspiration. It blows my mind that he can make that much money doing something that I love. But as I got older and reality set in, I realized that I may not be the best baseball player out here getting noticed by the League so I had to come up with a plan B. My plan B is playing baseball at the college level while earning my Bachelor’s Degree. My values The things I value in life are what makes me who I am today. I don’t know where I would be without my family, school and baseball. I love the life I live right now. I am exactly where I want to be. I am in college setting a good example for my younger brother Kobi and that means the world to me.

My Attitude Towards Technology
Buzz Buzz my phone is ringing! Technology is supposed to make us more connected. We can stay in touch with our friends all the time on Facebook, Twitter and Tumblr, and, of course, by texting. But are our smartphones actually getting in the way of real socializing? Could technology be making us more alone? Last weekend, I was watching television with a few friends, browsing the week’s most popular YouTube videos, when a piece in the comedy section called “I Forgot My Phone” caught my eye. As I was about to click play, however, a friend warned: “Oh, don’t watch that. I saw it yesterday, and it’s really sad.”

The two-minute video, which has been viewed more than 15 million times, begins with a couple in bed. The woman, played by the comedian and actor Kevin Hart, stares silently while his ex wife pays no mind and checks his smartphone. The subsequent scenes follow Ms. deGuzman through a day that is downright dystopian: people ignore her as they stare at their phones during lunch, at a concert, while bowling and at a birthday party. (Even the birthday boy is recording the party on his phone.) The clip ends with Ms. deGuzman back in bed with her boyfriend at the end of the day; he is still using his phone.

Ms. deGuzman’s video makes for some discomfiting viewing. It’s a direct hit on our smartphone-obsessed culture, needling us about our addiction to that little screen and suggesting that maybe life is just better led when it is lived rather than viewed. While the clip has funny scenes — a man proposing on a beach while trying to record the special moment on his phone sad.

How i Feel About Wikipedia
Keep your ears open and I’m sure you’ll hear this rant. Some member of the division — probably one of the more tradition-bound ones — will announce loudly that he or she forbids students to use Wikipedia or any other Web sources. Those within earshot will be regaled with a pious tirade on declining intellectual standards, the implication being that our fearless one-person crusader will single-handedly rescue Western thought from imminent collapse. If you’re skeptical of such pronouncements, you should be. It doesn’t matter whether we think students should or shouldn’t use Web sources such as Wikipedia; they will. We can and should require students to consult what we might call — for lack of a better term — more conventional sources. By all means schedule time to take your students to the library and meet with library specialists. Take them to the college archives as well. Show them where back issues of non-digitized journals are housed, where government documents are shelved, and let them know about germane special collections. Last semester I experimented with limited surrender and concluded I should have gotten out the white flag years ago. I reconsidered Wikipedia after a friend researching how it’s compiled and edited convincingly demonstrated that it’s at least as reliable as (if not considerably more so than) traditional encyclopedias such as Britannica. Like any general source, Wikipedia is of limited use, but that doesn’t mean it has no value whatsoever or that we should piously (attempt to) bar students from accessing it.

Read more: http://www.insidehighered.com/advice/instant_mentor/weir22#ixzz2yaM1n3md Inside Higher Ed

Read more: http://www.insidehighered.com/advice/instant_mentor/weir22#ixzz2yaLXnPxq Inside Higher Ed