2009

It's very odd to think that tommorw will start my year of graduation! May will be here before you know it. I think I'm spoiling a surprise here but I really don't care: I found out about 2 weeks ago that after the Senior Class Council and I put some hard work into a proposal, the President and Administration have agreed to hold Commencement at the Times Union Center in Albany! I'm so excited to be part of the first class to do this! If I'm lucky, I'm hoping to perhaps be selected as the Senior to give a speech to the class.

I hope everyone had a great holidy. As you have clearly all read, Finals were crazy up at school. I'm still waiting on one more grade to be finalized, but I'm pretty confident in the class, so it looks like the semester went great!

A couple quick notifications about my life: I was cast in Siena's Stage III (the drama club) production of Doubt to be performed in March. I was cast as the only male in the play, and you may have seen commercials since it was just released in theaters with Meryl Streep and Phillip Seymour Hoffman. I'm excited to see how that goes.

And finally, (I'm not sure if I've blogged about this yet, but...) in 2 and a half weeks, I will traveling to Washington DC to attend 4 days worth of Inauguration ceremonies. I will see Barack Obama sworn in, attend some conferences and panels with reporters and White House officials, witness the parade, as well as attend the Presedential Inaugural black tie Gala the night of the 2oth. I am SOOO excited to have this opportunity. Best of all, Siena sponosored almost the entire cost of the program. I promise I will be blogging about this experience while I am there and posting them when I have a chance.

Anyways that's all for now! Happy New Year and I hope things go well with your acceptance letters. Go Saints (they beat Holy Cross last night!)!!

VACATION!!

Hey everyone!,

Hope you'll all in good spirits for the holidays. Christmas is just a few days away of course, hope all the shopping is done, god knows mine has yet to start. I have one more day though eh? I haven't been on in a while and a lot has happened since. As most of my fellow bloggers may have already told you, our final exams were CANCELLED! YAY!...well more like postponed, but it was exciting at the time. The only thing that was sort of dissappointing was that I studied for days to take my bio test and when the day came, we were out of power, the campus was in shambles and people were being evacuated from the campus. All of my classes with the exception of my foundations class are holding optional examinations. I'm pleased at the way I ended my first semester at college, especially with all the traveling we did for hockey, getting orientated to the college atmosphere, etc... I plan to take only my bio when I get back to school in hopes of raising my grade. Aside from school vacation is going well. How about yours? I'm kind of bored though. I miss my friends at school, even though I'm hanging out with my friends from home almost everyday. I wish I back, but lets not wish our life away eh? Have a good holiday and a Happy New Year!

Peace, Josh

Minor Change of Plans

As my colleague Greg informed you all, final exams have been 'postponed' instead of 'canceled.' I guess getting out of taking my final exams was too good to be true after all. Fortunately though, I only have to take one final exam upon my return to Siena. Leaving for vacation two days earlier than planned also means I was not able to attend dinner at my professor's house like I had told you about earlier. Sure, that was disappointing, but given the fact that I am on break early, and given that fact that some of my professors chose not to administer a final, I'm not about to complain.

Have a great Holiday everybody!

--Mike DiSiena

Finals Cancelled?!

Well it has been quite an interesting week! A major snow and ice storm hit upstate/capital region and Siena lost power. Without power, heat, or hot water, administration had no choice but to send us all home….which meant FINALS GOT CANCELLED! That’s like something out of a movie, right?! Anyway, the academic deans did finally make the decision to give professors the option to either waive the final or provide an alternate assignment, however if a student wanted the opportunity to take the final, they created an exam week in January before Spring semester classes start. Its still so weird.
So I’m back home in Westchester now until January 14th and then I leave for the semester in Siena, Italy. I am so excited and I know its going to be an amazing experience.
Definitely stay tuned to my blog!!

Time for bed…back to work tomorrow haha

-Greg

So my first final is in an hour, but I had to share the good news: SIENA BEAT MARIST BY 17!!! Just thought you might like to know! :)

Finally Finals

Hey guys!

So finals start TOMORROW!! Actually that's kind of a lie. I have 2 finals that are take home that I've already looked at. You would think that would be cool, but the professors make those ones a bit harder because you have more time to complete them. I have my Logic final (great class with Josh Alexander!) and my Business to Business Marketing final to do over the next couple days. Here's a sample question from my Logic class final: "What does it mean to say that the validity of an argument does not depend on the actual truth values of the component statements?" Of course, I love this kind of stuff (remember: Philosophy minor, here) but I understand if it looks a bit crazy to you guys. I just started looking at this exam today. It's "Reading Day" which is the day before finals when there are no classes so students can study. Of course, I have yet to study a word and its 3:30. My only sit down final is tomorrow night, though so PLENTY of time (eek!).

Tonight, my Dad is coming up from Hartford, CT to go to the Siena vs. Marist game with me, then I have an indoor soccer game off campus at 10...looks like I'll start studying tomorrow!!

I'm sad to see half of my Senior year come to an end, but I'm excited for the home stretch over the next couple months! This past week I stepped down as President of Student Senate and handed the job over to the newly elected Steve Hannigan, a good friend of mine. I'm excited to see how he does over the next year. I will miss being involved in Student Government, but my time is up. I auditioned for a play here on campus and was cast as the only male in a 4 person show called Doubt (it's a movie coming out next week in theaters). I don't want to watch the movie until after the play next semester. But rehearsals will start in January so I'm excited for that.

Anyways that's my update. Hit me up with any questions! See ya over break!

Dunzoooo!

Hey guys!! Sorry you haven’t heard from me in a while…I have been insanely busy.
(You’re probably reading this saying…Greg says that when he begins every blog post) Haha
Anyways, yesterday was the last day of classes and I feel SO liberated. I had 2 projects that got finalized and handed in, as well as a presentation for another class that went great. Its so unbelievable the semester is over already…it went SOO fast.
Anyways, I had an amazing weekend. On Saturday night was the Albany vs. SUNY Albany men’s basketball game. SUNY is our cross-town rival and Siena students look forward to this exciting game. We play our basketball games in downtown Albany at the Times-Union Arena and it was PACKED. We ended up winning the game…sweeetttt!

Today is reading day and then I have my first 2 finals on Friday…and then 2 on Monday and 1 on Tuesday. I trying to tell myself not to stress about finals and just do the best I can.

I hope everyone’s college search is going well. Hopefully by this time you have all of your applications submitted and are just sitting back and waiting (or waiting by your mailboxes?). If you haven’t already done so, I strongly encourage you to come up and visit Siena when you have some free time!!!

OK….back to studying!
Greg

Now I know many of us have said that the semester has been busy for us in the past, but I have to say, this was the busiest week that I've experienced so far. The semester begins with excitement over returning back to your "Siena home" and the semester ends with excitement over returning to home sweet home.

I still have a few things to square away before my semester will be complete. Aside from finishing papers and taking exams I will have the opportunity to have dinner at one my professor's homes. As I mentioned a while back, I took a class on U.S. National Security post-9/11. The class was considered an "honors class," which means that you need to have a particularly strong academic record in order to be eligible to take the class. Classes like this are often close-knit and relationships develop between students and faculty that might not in a class of greater size (for instance, I usually don't even speak to the people next to me in my economics class). Well, this past class our professor said he would be delighted if everybody could join him for dinner. Needless to say, I'm wondering what kind of cook he is...in any case, I'll let you know.

Take Care,
Mike DiSiena

"There are two ways of getting home; and one of them is to stay there."~G.K. Chesterton

Home Sweet Home

Hi Everyone,

I have not blogged in a little while. I hope everything is going well with you! I hope you had an excellent thanksgiving.

For me, it was amazing being home with my family and friends. The food was outstanding and it absolutely beat the cafeteria food. I enjoyed all the little luxuries of life. For example, showering with no sandals, a really clean private bathroom, and of course great food. It's the little things in life.

Today is thursday, December 4. I have officially finished my Finance class, Accounting Class and Management. I do not have any more work for those classes until the final! The work is finally complete now it is just time to focus and study so I can do well on my final exams! I go home for Christmas break on December 12! Another semester at Siena is practically complete, I really have no idea where the time goes.

Once I finish my Spring 2009 semester, I am already half way through my career here! That's really depressing haha, I do not know where the time goes but I wish I could slow it down some.

Next semester I am registered for five classes instead of taking six this semester. I am taking Managerial Accounting, Managerial Finance, Astronomy, Philosophy, and Business Stats. My schedule is awesome and I have amazing professors. I have no classes on Friday's and my earliest class starts at 11:30 am. It's funny, I am already excited for next semester and I have not even finished this current semester nor have I even enjoyed my Christmas break. 

Let me know how the end of second quarter is going guys! Any new college information?

Anyone commit to Siena? Fill me in!

Love,

Patrick Creegan

Turkey Day Break

At last, Sunday has come and Thanksgiving Break has come to an end. I went home last Tuesday afternoon and came back today in the afternoon. Break came just in time, last week, I was sooo ready to go home! I was pretty burnt out from the entire semester and needed a break before I go hardcore for finals!

Being at home was great! I had a lot of fun with family. On Thanksgiving, I had dinner with my immediate family. It was only the four of us, but it was fantastic. Thanksgiving is one of the few holidays where everyone makes it a point to be home. Every year it gets increasingly difficult to get the entire family in one place.

I also did a bit of studying while I was at home, but saved all of Friday to hang out with my friends. I got to see one of my good friends from back home, Jen. She goes to the University of Connecticut. I almost went to UConn, but instead decided to go to Siena. It was the best choice I've ever made, and if I could go back in time, I'd make the same choice. However, I still ask about UConn a lot and wonder what it would be like if I went to school there. She's actually a CA at UConn which is a Community Assistant. It's the same as my RA job, so I talk to her a lot about her job and how UConn's Res Life is set up. Below is a picture of a couple of the friends I hung out with on Friday. We went to Gillette's Castle in CT and saw a vegetable cellar, so naturally, we took a picture in front of it.


Now I'm back at school and I've already started doing homework. I'm on duty later tonight, so I wanted to get the bulk of my work done before then. This week is going to be pretty busy for me. I've got a Sociology group project with a 10 page paper, a Histology group presentation on Tuesday, a Spanish group presentation due next monday which needs a full written script and videotaped, and... i have to read a full spanish play by the end of the week. Not to mention my Hisotlogy lab practical is this upcoming Wednesday. Oh! and a Religion paper I have to revise and submit.

Yeah, its a lot of work to get done in a week, but its certainly doable. I just have to crack down and make sure I'm efficient with my time. Finals start Wed the 10th and my two big finals are on that day, so as long as I can make it through the next 10 days, I'll be fine.

:o) I'll keep you folks posted on how all my projects, presentations, and papers go.

until next time,

Indira