As I finish up my second semester of College at Merritt and Laney college, I’ve learned a lot as I gone on throughout the time being in the English 1A class taught by Ms. Oliver.  I’ve also met some great friends and students as well. I look backward at my life before I was entered this class, inward when I was on my road to pass this class, outward while doing our service learning activity, as well as forward looking into the future. I have gain more experience and  knowledge on how to conduct these kinds of activities which can benefit me and many others in the future. As well i see the ties of how English 1A is tied with service learning, on how it can affect communities and bring many together.

    Before I entered Ms.Oliver's class, “english 1A”, I really didn’t think that we be doing a service learning activity or have much to do with hip hop. On the first day of the second semester of english 1A class, I first entered the small classroom tired from the other classes and working out very early in the morning. I thought to myself, here we go, another homework, essay packed class, that I’m going to have to do. I looked around and surprised that the class was filled with students, which kind of made me happy, because i noticed in the past the semester, some classes are like halfway or barely have 15 students in the class. If ya’lll haven’t noticed I sit in the same spot all the time so I can see the board clearly and able to understand information better. I also was a bit shy and felt like I need to sit by myself so I can concentrate better on passing this class. The first time I saw Ms.Oliver walk into the room and introduce herself, I thought she was pretty hip and cool professor. At the same time hoping she doesn’t give out tremendous amount of homework and classwork.

Thinking this class would be boring and somewhat uninteresting, as classes progressed and I’ve changed the way I think and see things. When Ms. Oliver had us do group activities like rap battle with other groups, discussing who is the better DJ. Having a “Hip Hop For Change representative” come in and talk to us about social justice and problems we have in the community and in the governmental system. It began to be very interesting to me, because the amount of things happening and being talked about in that class. Also was easier to understand the subjects of this course because it uses hip hop, rap and evolved modern day culture and events. Like back in Highschool I used to be apart of multiple drama performances like Footloose, Alice in Wonderland, The Boyfriend, a mystery genre performance, which I forgot its name. I’ve been parts of multiple clubs like political and weight lifting. I’ve had lots of experience being part of a group or leading them so doing service learning activities was not much new to me.

Talking about events, I was really surprised when we had to create a music showcase towards the end of the semester. I was grouped up with Franco, and DaShawn, who were good classmates to work with and as well turned out to be great friends! Our group was the “logistics”, we were in charged of the date, time, and location of the event. As well as how and where we can get or reserve equipment. Our task was not as hard and was not much of a hassle to overcome. We were able to exchange information and make multiple group chats so we we’re able to keep in touch. Even though we are the logistics crew, our job wasn’t as easy as it seemed, It involved taking time to talking and going to ASLC meetings and we had to meet people so we could actually work something out and reserve a date and time. Presenting to the class of our idea of a date, time and location was sort’ve difficult because people got different opinions and some were not ready to be ready by then. DaShawn, Franco and I were literally running around everywhere trying to get stuff done and thing worked out so we could actually have a showcase. I remember a time where I had to present our showcase Idea to full room of people who knew more about doing club activities and events. I felt I did my best even though we had some information that we still needed and were questioned. I did not know some answers But I was able to at least do an alright ish job. With that happening m logistics crew  was able to help get a $1,000 loan from ASLC, to run our showcase. On that day I felt proud that my group was able to help with that, and get more involved. Yet that wasn’t our part of what we needed to do for our group, I felt like we pitched in a lot. We are the logistics crew, not the whole showcase crew. Besides that I understand some people from the other groups got other classes to focus on and I felt like we didn’t have much communication with other groups. That made it harder on us because we needed to find out information like rappers, loans, intel and the progress of the other groups. On the day of the showcase, I was thinking that this showcase is going to turn out horrible, because of non-communication, papers that still needed to be filled out, and flyers that were not yet handed out. As time furthered on, I was happy to see a group of people sitting under the shades looking towards the tent where DJ Intellect was doing his music. Then I see people getting up and dancing, which made me feel like this is a success. I saw how hip hop brings people together. At the end of the day, I felt like we do good as a class that only meets once a week for barely two hours a day. I wonder how it would really look like if this was planned better, and if this class had more time interacting with one another.

    Through this service learning activity, I noticed how it ties with our english portion of class. I see how hip hop can change the way of communities and bring people together by its way to influence. Music contains literature in its music, that literature can be something very strong to communities. Like 2Pac’s quote of a rose rising between cracks of concrete, “The Rose That Grew from Concrete” is a poetic representation of the life struggles of 2Pac. It acknowledges the harsh conditions in which 2Pac was raised and thus the miracle that he was able to rise from those conditions”. People in poverty and not in the best place in the world lose hope. Yet when it looks like there is no hope left, little things like a crack in concrete, can help you rise to success. I learned as well mainstream music has its way making money by producing music which involves, sex, drugs, violence, etc, and turns it all into something for all of us to cheer at. I see how hip hop can drastically change the world as it seems. The service learning activity “ The Music Showcase” was a success because with the power and words of the literature in the music, brought us together. I saw that by us standing, having fun and dancing in the courtyard looks like it bring people together. English reminded me and taught me that literature is everywhere and runs our media. In all, i see the ties of how English 1A is tied with service learning, on how it can affect communities and bring many together. Very blessed to end this year with such a memorable class, I will miss the friends and students I have met.