A Portfolio
of
Theo Daikh
WHOS
Still Figuring "it" All out
My friend ben (left), alex (right), and i (middle) at our summer landscaping job (2022)
A blog about my time at U of a, and where im headed
These are pictures from when I got a chance to fly an airplane. My parents got me a flight lesson as a christmas gift after I had been showing interest for quite some time. I hope to get my licence some day when I have time
When I first came to the University of Arizona, I was very determined to jump into my studies, and get into research as soon as possible. I had already experienced a lot of freedom at home, both my parents worked full time as doctors, and as soon as I got my driver’s license I was able to be my own person. I think everyone struggles at first when they have complete freedom, so it helped having already had that experience before coming to college. One expectation that I had coming here was that it was going to be really easy to meet similar people in my classes going into engineering. I’m smart, like science and math, and like building things. The issue was, my classes were in hundred plus person lectures, a setting that was completely different for me, and a bit overwhelming at first. I went to a small private school in Portland, Maine my whole life that had around 500 kids pre-K - 12th grade. There were more people in just my intro classes than I had ever gone to school with. Initially, I kind of liked the material I was learning. Because college was so new, I think it was challenging and the pace was plenty to handle. I also filled some extra free time in some clubs in the engineering program.
Overtime, I had found that my interests were simply larger than could be satisfied by just engineering. While I thought I was going to meet a lot of like minded people in engineering, through my engineering classes and clubs, I found that in general, engineers tend to be obsessed with something specific like trains, cars, or planes. While I find all those things cool, I found that I need to be intellectually challenged in other ways than just science and math class, and don’t have that same obsession that I found other engineers have. I started reading history and philosophy books on the side, even taking a week off classes this semester just to read books for fun. Try and find another college student that skips classes to learn something different. Basically, I found that I really needed to change things up. I was also not as excited about jumping into research as the professors in the engineering department really turned me off from wanting to work with them. Some of the most interesting and fast paced development and research takes place because of private companies and good ideas, not the standard college research process, so I have been looking for other ways to get into research.
Picture from when I visited Titan Missile Silo in Tucson
Picture from when I visited Observatory on Mount Lemmon
It took me a few semesters, but finally I learned I was capable of learning almost anything from textbooks. This English class is the only class where I make any effort in consistent attendance, because it's the only one that takes attendants, and I get As and Bs on my exams from learning on my own. This begs the question, what am I paying $40,000 dollars for? I’ve been thinking through all of this for a while now, and it came clear to me that I needed to really change things up. I decided to transfer back home to the University of Maine and switch my major to something along the lines of physics, math, and philosophy in order to have a background in a wider variety of areas, and challenge myself in other ways. I was talking to my sister when I was just starting to decide to transfer and I told her I thought I made the wrong decision, but she reminded me how excited I was to come out here. At the time it clearly was the right choice, but after living it and experiencing it I was able to learn more about myself and decide a new path forward. I have found that I, along with everyone else, is very different, and need to find what is best for myself. I have found that the standard “college experience” isn’t for me, and I need to find a way to finish my degree in a way best suitable for my interests so that I can move on.
My Dog Gromit
A big change I plan on making is trying to learn in as many other ways as possible outside of school. I want to do things that will give me real world experience in the direction that I want to be headed. A starting place for this is this summer, I am starting my first company with a couple of friends. My goal is to develop my leadership skills, and learn all the functions of a company so that I can use that knowledge to do bigger things in the future. The company is going to be a landscaping company. We have worked for a small landscaping company for the last few summers, and have gotten the opportunity to take over some clients from that company, and are finding many more. I am extremely excited because it feels like I am finally doing something that is moving me towards my future goals and ambitions, and I am continuing to do it with my closest friends.
My Dog Trouble
Reflecting On Rhetorical Awareness
I came into this writing class with a different mindset than I ever have. It has been over a year since my last English class, and this time I have more of an idea where and who I want to be in the future, and know what I don’t know, and what I need to learn. I had developed some forms of writing quite well, but my ability to use rhetorical awareness was certainly lacking. One of the reasons I want to be good at writing is to be able to inspire and motivate people into action, and to do that you need to know how to use appropriate rhetorical strategies for the situation. I think I learned a lot more of the use of rhetorical awareness in the argumentative essay, and not necessarily because I used it particularly well there, but because the issue I was writing about was so important in my opinion I can keep thinking of different ways I could have tried to use different elements of ethos, pathos, and logos in order to appeal to different aspects of people to convey the importance of the issue.
The idea of rhetorical awareness had always been abstract before
this class. It became glaringly obvious when we went over how it is
embedded in every add we see, such as this Pepsi add with Steve Martin.
Reflecting On Critical Thinking and Composition
Critical thinking and being able to compose a strong, sound argument. I was able to work on this in both of the argumentative essays. In both, I attacked complicated issues that don’t have clear answers. That is why it was important to go over a wide range of material in order to form an informed opinion. Then, problem solving a strong argument for a solution requires a lot of critical thinking skills. I would say critical thinking is definitely one of my strong suites. I like to perform under pressure, and solve complex problems, but it was fun to research different topics and continue developing these skills.
Reflecting On Reflection
Reflection, along with mindfulness, where two ideas pushed heavily throughout my life, but they were just words for a long time. Both; however, are incredibly important tools in order to learn from mistakes and stay grounded. Reflection has been incredibly important to recognize, where I am, where I came from, and where I would like to go. Honestly, just writing the blog post forced me to write and reflect about some things I had really only been thinking about. I found this was incredibly helpful because it almost allowed me to achieve some sort of clarity, and metaphorically, close some tabs in my brain.
I have found that music has been a good way to regulate the level of stimulus
required for whatever I am doing. For instance, if I am doin something that
requires a lot of mental focus, something less complex is better, but if I am
doing something that requires very little mental focus, I like to listen to
something more loud and complex. I used to never listen to classical music,
but I found that it is very good to listen to while reading or doing homework.
1812 Overture, other song like it I really enjoy for reading because it starts
slow, but as it builds up and gets more complex it helps things like my
reading speed.