Kemper Knauss

Nadra Fredj

HONORS 100

2 December 2023

Autumn Reflection

Autumn Quarter brought on lots of self-reflection as I entered a new period of my life. Growing

up and my parents and brother being an UW alumnus I had a pretty complete knowledge of what

life on campus was like, but something that was unexpected at UW was how quickly I found a

very solid friend group in college. As well as how I met those friends meeting many of my close

in the line for free Adidas clothes during dawg daze. Something that surprised me in the first

quarter for Honors was how interesting the honors classes were even when I didn’t originally

think I would be very passionate about the class or topic. As well as the quality of teachers in

honors made me wanted to pursue many new topics in a much more liberal arts and humanities-

based spaces that I wasn’t originally interested in having originally not planning on investing

much time into the humanities spaces and topics while at UW. Another thing that I would like to

explore further at UW, is RSO as while I feel that I have good friends on campus and plenty of

time to socialize I think in the future having some sort of outside of School commitment would

be beneficial to helping me get prepared not only for quarters with more work but would help me

be introduced to new people. This mix of finding a new friend group and finding the correct

lifestyle split between social and academics gives me hope and confidence moving forward in

college, as one of my biggest worries was that my sacrifices in high school to get into UW would

just begin again in college working for my degree and that I wouldn’t be able to find a friend
group or find a good work life balance to college that being a major thing I lacked in high school.

Something that gave me confidence moving forward in Honors though was how interesting I

found the classes to be, I was warry of applying to honors in the first place because I heard it was

very liberal arts focused, however the people I have met in the classes, the topics covered in the

classes, and the faculty as well all have made me confident in my future in the honors program

and confident that I will be able to find new interests through the interdisciplinary nature of the

program. Despite this there are a couple of things that I am still worried about, the first thing is

the experiential learning requirements for honors, I am interested in pursuing learning

opportunities such as study abroad however given my major in CS finding a study abroad that

will allow me to continue the progression in my degree is very hard to find and fit into a

schedule that would work well with my four year plan. Something that I hope to achieve by the

end of my first year in Honors is a portfolio that I can look back on to remember the good times

at college as something that I feel I need to do more of is take pictures of the time I spend with

friends to look back on and that is something that in the creation of the autumn section of the

Honors portfolio I felt I was lacking in. Something that I hope to achieve by the end of my time

at UW is obviously a degree and some sort of internship or work experience that will help me get

a job after school, but also a solid friend group that I can stay connected with throughout the rest

of my life outside UW, and times to look back on so that when my kids ask about college the

same way I did with my parents I have plenty of memories to share about UW with them so

hopefully the legacy of Huskies continues in my family.