Who/What/Where Will I be Recording?
For the podcast, I am going to be discussing why getting involved in school extracurriculars improves your grades. It will just be me talking, and I am going to record using my phone’s microphone and I will be reserving a study room in the library to record. I’m not exactly sure what my sound effects will be, but I was thinking the hustle and bustle in the CRUC could be cool.
My Rough Script:
Introduction (0-10 seconds)
Opening Hook: “Ever wondered why some students seem to excel in both academics and extracurriculars?”
Thesis Statement: Getting involved at school leads to better grades, let’s explore how!
Background (10-20)
For context, Alexander Astin describes student involvement as “the amount of physical and psychological energy that the student devotes to the academic experience.” That will be the definition I’m using when referring to student involvement
Point 1: Skill Development (20-50 seconds)
Explanation: Extracurricular activities help students develop essential skills like leadership, teamwork, time management, and problem-solving.
Evidence: Skills such as leadership, time management, and teamwork are taught in classes but the full extent of them can’t be understood until they are applied in the real world. For example, students will learn a little bit about teamwork in a group project, but they won’t understand the full extent of it because at the end of the day they just want the best grade they can get. A tea working towards a common goal, making mistakes and learning from them is really how student can learn teamwork.
Personal Anecdote: It also allows them to learn skills such as Canva or Microsoft Word from other students when classes don’t normally go over these applications. When I started working at SAE, I was working with a girl named Sky. Sky and I were tasked to make a post for the Instagram, letting people know that UMW’ club carnival had been moved inside. I saw Sky holding down the shift button while grouping objects that she wanted to move together. I had no idea this was a thing, and for years had been frustrated by the clicking and dragging method that would almost always pick up something that I didn’t want to be moved. Had I not worked with Sky on those posts, I never would have learned this much easier method.
Point 2: Building a Support Network (50-80 seconds)
Explanation: When a student spends a lot of time with a specific club or job, they build relationships with other students and staff
Evidence: Alexander Astin said “The student is spending time on the campus, thus increasing the likelihood that he or she will come into contact with other students, professors, and college staff… Retention suffers, however, if the student works off campus at a full-time job. Because the student is spending considerable time and energy on nonacademic activities that are usually unrelated to student life, full-time work off campus decreases the time and energy that the student can devote to studies and other campus activities.
This takes us to out last point:
Personal growth and confidence (80-100 seconds)
Explanation: When coming to college, it is a lot of student’s first time being independent and managing their life. Confidence is crucial for a student’s success, and they gain it through those newfound skills and support network.
Evidence: In Nancy Schlossberg’s “Marginality and Mattering” she cites a study by Morris Rosenberg, who says ‘mattering is a motive: the feeling that others depend on us, are interested in us, are concerned with our fate, or experience us as an ego-extension exercises a powerful influence on our actions’ This leads to students caring about their academics and work. Students who feel they matter are less likely to act out and ruin what they have worked for.
Conclusion (100-120 seconds)
Summary: It is important for students to get involved because it teaches them new skills, it fosters a strong support network, and it leads to personal confidence inside and outside of the classroom
For more information on what I’ve discussed you can check out my sources: Alexander Astin’s Theory of Student Involvement, Nancy Schlossberg’s Marginality and Mattering, and Morris Rosenberg’s Mattering: Inferred Significance to Parents and Mental Health Among Adolescents.
So, if you want to boost your grades, consider joining a club, job, or sports team at your school. It might just be the key to your success.
My Audio Recording
Reflection
This topic is about how getting involved at school improves your academic success. I found this topic interesting because one would think that the more involved you get, the less time you have to focus on school. However, I have learned from personal experience in high school and college that my grades improve when I get more involved. I just used the microphone on my phone for my test recording and then used my AirPods to listen to the recording. I used Copilot to help me format the script. I needed some assistance because the way I was formatting the script was turning it into an essay. Copilot helped me with the timing and breaking up the ideas.
