I want to continue to be a creative person who constantly adds new mediums to my arsenal.  I want to be someone who can view a problem from multiple angles and begin to see different answers for the same issue.  I want to be more fired up about my future and achieving my dreams.  I want to be someone who cares about grades, but knows a letter or percentage does not define me.  I want to be someone who pushes not only myself to do the best that I can do in everything that I do, but pushes others to do the same.  I want people to be able to look up to me and use me as an example.

I want to be the best version of myself every day and set such an example.  I want to be someone my sister can be proud of, as well as the rest of my family.  I want to be able to look back and feel satisfied with everything that I have done and know that I have done my best.  I want to be someone who my younger self would be ecstatic to meet.  I want to be a great scientist who is fair and just and makes a change in the system.  I want to travel and study abroad in order to widen my horizons.  I want to be a respected scholar, student, and classmate who is seen as reliable.  I want to be more involved on campus and meet new people.  

These statements made me reflect on what I am really after, who I currently am, and who I want to become.  I feel like I summed up my feelings pretty well, despite struggling to say them out loud.  Aspects of these statements may change in the future, but I think that many things will stay the same for the time being.  A lot of the things I spoke about in these statements mean a lot to me or hold a deeper meaning.  I hope that I can continue to add onto these statements as I grow and change.

I want to become a forensic biologist who works for the state.  With all of the knowledge that I have gained, I just know that I will be prepared to do exceptionally well in that field.  I am still striving to become more creative and make room for creative outlets in the midst of my very science-heavy life and education.  Since my sister has started her own college journey, I want to be someone that she can turn to for guidance and become someone that she can look up to and rely on even beyond college.  I want to continue to make my family proud and become a respected colleague in my future career.  

I want to travel more and become further experienced in things outside of forensic science and biology.  I think that doing these things will help me to become a more well-rounded person.  This will, in turn, help me in all aspects of my life.  I want to become a greater version of myself, learning new things every day as I have done my whole life.

I was only in my second semester as a freshman when I wrote my initial statements, so I had only recently graduated from high school.  I believe it was during this semester that I was allowed to declare my second major of biology (on top of my forensics one), and did so the moment I was able to.  I was really excited to begin my journey as a double major.  I am now in my last semester, a senior, about to graduate.  In my initial reflection, I had mentioned that while aspects of my statements may change over time, that the majority of what I said would remain true.  

I was right.  My old and new statements are similar, but my current one is more career and post-college focused as I enter the next phase of my life.  I have done so much since my initial statements, things that I never thought I would ever do.  I interned with the Indiana State Police’s forensic biology sector in Indianapolis, I have made great connections with professors, studied abroad, have maintained grades that have matched my expectations, and continued to drive myself to absorb all the information I could.  I had written that I had hoped to become someone a younger me would be very happy to meet, and I think I have managed to do so.  

After attending this school for the past four years, it is safe to say that I have experienced so many things I never thought I would ever get the chance to.  Back in my H200 class as a freshman, I was tasked with creating a "journey map" consisting of goals I wanted to complete at certain points during my college career.  Everything from making new friends, to joining clubs, to internships were all things that I wrote down.  This was done in the hopes of making a map to follow throughout the incoming years.  I, however, did not use this map throughout the years and ultimately forged my own path, achieving my goals in different ways than I had originally written down.  Looking back, it is fascinating to see how my journey actually came to be when compared to my original plan.

Looking at my two journey maps, it is clear that, while a lot has changed, they ended up being relatively the same.  For the first year, nothing really changed except for the fact that I actually achieved my goal of keeping a 3.5 GPA or higher.  Year 2, however, is where things started to change.  I felt very stressed my sophomore year and almost changed my major due to the pressure I felt from my classes.  I was able to talk things over with one of my favorite professors and he helped answer my questions regarding the forensic science major and forensic science as a career.  This conversation ultimately led me to staying on the forensics track.  Freshman year me definitely did not predict this, and even suggested that I start looking for internships or lab work to take on with an already busy schedule.  Due to the stress that I felt, I decided not to worry about these things.  I did, however, correctly predict that I would complete my first honors contract in my second year and I did so with Dr. Meghan Barrett in Cell Biology.  I also correctly predicted that I would learn to cook some new things, as well as becoming a forensic science club member.

...

Despite the divergence in my second year, everything that I predicted that would happen in my third year ultimately came to be.  An opportunity arose for an internship with Indiana State Police's forensic biology sector in Indianapolis.  I decided, since I felt much better and my courses allowed a lot of free time that fall semester, to apply.  I ended up getting it and spent the semester working on a very cool project and did a lot of networking with the people at the lab.  In the spring, I was invited to take another course with Dr. Meghan Barrett called "Cell Biology Pedagogy" where I was her teaching assistant; yet another correct prediction from freshman year me.   I had also said that I would have a study abroad lined up by my third year, and I ended up not only having it lined up, but going abroad to South Korea in the summer of that year.  

...

While my fourth and final year is still currently unfolding, my predictions from freshman year are coming true.  I really wanted to, back then, create an honors contract with a forensics course so that I could create a forensics-centered project.  I ended up doing two forensic contracts in my junior year.  For one, I did a group project and tested how efficient different Tide products were at getting out biological stains.  We used forensic testing to see if any trace of the biologicals remained.  For the other contract, I contacted the Indiana State Police forensic laboratory in Lowell, Indiana and spoke to one of their forensic scientists.  I conducted an interview with her and ended up touring their new lab facility where I was able to meet with her in person.  I wanted to complete my biology capstone hours by using lab credits, but, since I did not pursue any lab work due to my second year, this seemed to have fallen through...until my forensic biology internship was counted towards it.  I worked with my advisor and the director of the forensic science program in order for that credit to count, and it was finally approved in my fourth year.

...

So, while I may not be a peer mentor, have a position in a lab, or have a long-term internship, it appears that my predictions were pretty spot on.  I got to do a lot of incredible things these past four years, some that even my freshman self could not have predicted.  Junior year was when I really felt like I was having a lot of fun with my coursework, exploring the city, and trying tons of new things.  I think that the me of the past would be impressed with how much I have grown as a person and how much I have been able to accomplish.  I have met so many incredible people, too, whether it was through networking or just making new friends.  While I may not have used my H200 map as a guide for my college career, the goals that I wrote down were reflective of who I was back then and who I wanted to be.  I think that, based on how similar my journey ended up being, that I succeeded in becoming that person.