The finale. Thank you all for being a part of this journey

Today on What I Wish I Knew we sit down with NJIT Professor, Theatre department admin, and independent filmmaker Rodney Reyes. Rodney has been a mentor to me during my time here at NJIT and today I wanted to switch gears and talk about his backstory and struggles in the world of performing/visual arts.

Today we are changing gears and going back to a solo show. I thought this would be an important time to reflect. I’ve noticed a trend here at my school and I’m sure it resonates with students nationwide, that this time of year feels like crunch time overdrive. Today my goal is to walk through those emotions, struggles, and experiences and look at the value of such emotions.

Today we have Alana Garcia on the podcast! Alana is a friend of mine not only from some similar communications classes but even from the theatre department where we both work. This edition marks the half way point in the semester and so having Alana on is the perfect fit since we both share classes and the workplace. On this episode we do a check in on our fall semester’s as well as dive into Alana’s personal college experience. I ask her all about what she wished she knew beforehand about coming to a school that was never even on her radar way back when she was a freshman. This episode will really add perspective as to what a true college experience is and how it is not just a blanket experience for all.

Today we have the first guest on the podcast! Kathy Thompson is heavily involved in the NJIT community from being a student to working for the CS department. Today we dive into how she juggles all of her responsibilities plus get an understanding for her story before landing in NJIT. Her story is different than any other guest I have on the podcast because of her being a mother. Yes she is an NJIT undergrad, NJIT CS Department Assistant to the Chair, and a mother. What a woman indeed! There’s so much value in her words but ranking number one is her advice to students about keeping their head high during their hardest hours in college.

This mark the end of the first 3 introductory episodes. In this fashion I switch gears and explain a personal lesson I had to learn over time. This is in hope that the audience will learn and develop the skill of weighing their options and making executive decisions with their hard-pressed time. The art of saying “no” is not so straight forward for many people especially in college where people are willing to get involved with multiple and sometime too many projects. This episode dives into what makes a project worth signing onto.

Today’s program focuses on my story but this time surrounding the topic of passion, scheduling, time management, and more. I really want the audience to walk away knowing that their struggle is felt by thousands and thousands of others and they are not alone in their stress. I aim to provide remedy to this stress over this podcast episode.

I tell stories about my childhood and some advice I would give to a younger self. I went all the way to my junior year of college explaining mistakes and times I should’ve handled things differently. Yes some of this material was personally but I also constantly referred to my struggles through the lens of any college student to encourage retention rather than viewers thinking they are just being told stories. This allows for a teaching moment and connection rather than just storytelling