Continuing Academic Success Essay

Continuing Academic Success is extremely important to those who plan to make advancements in their chosen career fields. It provides the opportunity to keep current with ideas, techniques, and advancements that are being made in their area of employment. We will address the importance of setting achievable goals, the importance of learning styles in academic success and the validity of ethics and academic integrity in helping to achieve continuing academic and professional success. Setting Goals Distinct, clearly defined goals that can be measured will allow a person to take pride in accomplishing the goals they have set. They are able to see clear forward progress in what otherwise might seem a long drawn out process. Setting goals allows one to choose where they want to go in school or in a career and what they want to achieve. Knowing what they want to achieve, helps them know what they have to concentrate on and improve. Goal setting gives one long-term vision and short-term motivation. By setting goals students and employees can: improve their academic and career performance, increase their motivation to achieve, increase pride and satisfaction in performance and improve their self- confidence. Setting goals and measuring their achievements allow the goal setters to see what they have done and what they are capable of doing. Seeing their results gives them confidence and assurance and motivation they need to believe they can achieve higher goals. Effective goal setting requires one to express goals positively, be accurate, set priorities, keep goals small, set goals one can control and set specific measurable goals. Writing down your goals symbolizes a real commitment to strive to make them reality. My educational goal is to increase pride and satisfaction in performance while studying to obtain my degree. Knowing the importance of writing as a form of communication, it my desire to improve my writing skills in an effort to better express my ideas in a manner that will be clear, coherent and understandable. My career goa is to obtain my Associate’s Degree in Health Care Administration by the summer of 2016. Goal setting provides a positive means to help motivate the learner. Motivation is a necessary part of  providing the learners with initiative and incentive to accomplish the goals they have established. Motivation is that drive or desire to do are accomplish a given task. â€Å"A common lay person’s definition of motivation is that it involves a strong personal interest in a particular subject or activity. Students are motivated and they learn and achieve because of this strong interest.†9 (Linnebrink, 2002)Students and employees are motivated in many different ways but their motivation can vary based upon the situation or context in which they find themselves, (Linnebrink,2002) which means motivation is inherently changeable and sensitive to the context. Motivation will also vary based upon the subject matter being taught. Study results show that students who participate in religious services more frequently usually have a more positive self- image, feel good about school, have parental involvement, have fewer behavior problems and make higher scores. ((Toldson, 2010) Learning Styles Another major factor in the achievement of continuing academic success is the learner’s awareness of their unique learning styles. Learning styles refer to the different strengths and preferred methods students and employees: use to receive and process information. Awareness of their learning styles is most beneficial to them in the achievement of continuing academic success. Learning style is about how the learner learns most effectively, knowing this allows the learners to use those educational methods strategies that is best facilitate their learning styles. Learning styles include, but are not limited to, visual (seeing), auditory (hearing), tactile or Kinesthetic (doing) and reading and writing preference learner’s. No learner’s is limited to one style of learning, but all have a preferred style. Being a kinesthetic learner, I prefer to do, participate in, discover. Kinesthetic learners need to move around while being involved in activities. Involvement doing increases their understanding. These learner’s short and long term memories are strengthened by their use of movement. They use their bodies as a means of expressing thoughts, ideas and concepts. Importance of Ethics & Academic Integrity Ethics-is the study of the basic values of a community; moral principles that  govern a person’s or groups behavior. Through the study of ethics we learn to understand what is expected of us behaviorally and why it is expected of us. We also learn rules of behavior based upon ideas about what is morally good and bad. Academic integrity means honesty and responsibility in scholarship. This includes values such as avoidance of cheating or plagiarism; maintenance of academic standards; honesty and rigor in research and academic publishing. Academic Integrity is based upon ethics, which is the study of the basic value of a community. Academic work should be a result of one’s own effort. It dishonest and show a lack of integrity to claim creativity for someone else’s work in any form. Growing up in a black church has lead me to be exposed to the influence of the black church on the moral and academic development of its students. â€Å"The study explored how religious influence affects academic achievement among black students. On a basic level this study found that all students participated in more religious activities and who had stronger religious convictions were more likely to report higher grades in school. The study does not determine that religion leads to higher grades.† The Ethical Lens Inventory make me aware of the fact that when I don’t have the information I need I’m tempted to excuse myself from following the rules, convincing myself that rules are for other people. In such situations, it is incumbent to remember that I, like everyone else must abide by the rules and regulations because they are set for the good of the community not just for me. Conclusion Continuing Academic Success requires the setting of distinct and clearly defined goals that can be measured. This allows one to choose where they want to go and what they want to achieve. Motivation is an important factor in this process. Awareness of individual learning styles is beneficial in achieving success. And adherence to ethics and academic integrity is a moral responsibility of all who are involved in academic endeavors. References 1. Gokalp, M. (2013, October). The Effect of Student’s Learning Styles to Their Academic Success. Creative Education, 4(10), pgs. 627-632. 2. Linnebrink, E. A., & Pintrich, P. R. (2002). Motivation as an enabler for  academic success. School of Psychology Review, 31(3), pg. 313-328 3. Toldson, Ivory A. & Anderson, Kenneth A. (2010) The Role of Spirituality, Religion and the African American Church on Educational Outcomes (Summer 2010)