Challenges Faced by First-Generation College Students For many first-generation college students, stepping onto a college campus is more than just pursuing a degree; it is about breaking barriers, reshaping family narratives, and striving for a better future. These students want an educational journey filled with ambition and perseverance, yet they often encounter significant challenges that can make success seem like an uphill battle. Financial struggles, lack of guidance

By Martin Hernandez Introduction We have all been there. You graduated from high school and are looking forward to attending college. It’s exciting and exhilarating. You studied plenty in high school but will these methods hold up in a college environment? Will your study methods get you through to receive the coveted Bachelors degree in whichever career you have chosen? I have compiled several study methods (some of them scientifically proven) that will boost your GPA IF

By Dominick Guerra Searching for assistance on campus may be hard, you might not know where it can be, and you don’t know if what UTRGV offers can help you solve your problem. I’ve had this experience during my first semester of my college experience, and there is so much within the campus that I didn’t know about until my second semester. I will give the knowledge that I’ve gained throughout my time here, by providing important locations that help in any problems you may ha

Optimistic. Nostalgic. 1302 Rhetoric and Composition students, take lead on an extensive research, to find out what they had missed. Now eager to spread out the truth behind reading more than assigned. By Carolina Pavon, Andrew Martinez & Alexa Sanchez March 24,2016 How does extra-curricular reading for first year composition students affect their overall writing? It may be true that there are many beneficial ways to improve one's writing by simply reading a book. Alth

Why Do online First Year Composition Students Procrastinate? Distant learning students procrastinate on research papers because their attention is not focused on school work, but the activities that are entertaining to them. We felt that this issue needed to be explored because distant learning and online learning is a fairly new topic amongst society that is barely being accepted. It is an alternative form of learning usually online, or at home. Why is it that distant learn

Don’t you hate when you’re sitting in front of computer, about to start your essay or research paper and all you see is a blank screen? Then, you realize that not only is the screen blank, but so is your mind. Perhaps it's not that your mind has gone blank at all, but rather that you're more far more concerned with having perfect grammar. How can we avoid it or where can we go to for help? Compocon would be the answer! Well, what is Compocon? Compocon is the perfect place

Expectations I walk into the room expecting to see an auditorium full of people listening to a speaker present on the mistakes college students are making when they are doing a research paper, and to top it off going through a PowerPoint on how our writing is not up for the professional world. However, I entered a normal looking classroom, where I could see myself taking a class, barely full of students, but at times there were some students sitting on the floor, and the most

Compocon is a composition conference for English 1302 students to have an opportunity to have an informal conversation with professionals and experts from the university.This year, Compocon-The SPARK took place at the University of Texas-Pan American Ballroom on February 18th and 19th.The purpose of Compocon was to help students Develop the Big Question.The Big question is basically just what their question will be like for their research. In order to get help from a professi

When we were assigned to attend the first week of COMPOCON I was a bit hesitant about it because I had never attended a writing convention before or even knew what it was going to be about. I didn't know how helpful it would be. I just thought the COMPOCON sessions were going to be covering what I already knew. Although COMPOCON was more like a small convention of information for English students. The first COMPOCON event of 2015 was an all week event in which you went and ex

By Krystina Ortiz and Antonio Salinas Attending Compocon opened our eyes to the intricate processes that occur at each step of the writing process. We hope to give you a taste of what we experienced and we hope that this will help students in their writing endeavors of First Year Composition. Compocon is a series of sessions that sets out to teach first year composition students their different options they can use in helping with their writing and aims to give students a b