In this blog post, I’ll reflect on the effort I put into my studies during high school, my participation in school activities, and the lessons I learned through empathy and collaboration.
Academic Experiences and Reflections
The idea that “the learning process is the process of managing oneself” originated from my experience taking a career planning class during my sophomore year of high school. Through the process of self-reflection and future planning in that career course, I decided to pursue business administration as my career path. Contrary to the common perception that it is simply a major chosen by humanities students, I came to view business as a discipline that encompasses not only running a company but also managing a household, leading a class, and planning and executing my own learning.
When I connected business to the essence of being human, learning itself began to look like a small-scale management activity. On a small scale, it involves making plans; on a larger scale, it is a series of processes where you execute those plans, receive feedback, and then create new plans. Therefore, whenever I studied, I tried to develop the habit of approaching it from a manager’s perspective—setting plans and managing them.
I experienced the effectiveness of this “learning management” particularly clearly in my English classes. This was because I formed a study group with three friends and managed our English studies by dividing them into specific sections. Although the four of us had similar overall skill levels, our individual weaknesses differed, so we divided roles to turn those weaknesses into strengths.
We managed the study group based on the sections each of us was responsible for. The friend in charge of listening managed the study time and workload, ensuring everyone followed the rules, while the friend in charge of vocabulary created quizzes, recorded scores, and handled motivation. The member in charge of reading comprehension set specific volumes for regular practice and improved our skills by having us take turns explaining the solutions.
Since I was relatively weak in grammar, I took charge of that section, selecting example problems for each unit to solve together and organizing the explanations. By clearly defining each member’s role in this way, not only did our individual self-management skills improve, but our overall English grades also rose significantly. This experience instilled in me the belief that systematic management of learning leads to better results.
Write about major campus activities and reflections
With the mindset that “A flea market is first and foremost about the seller, and secondly about marketing,” I meaningfully expanded the activities of my campus accessory design club. The club primarily focused on designing everyday items and crafting them by hand. I enjoyed making jewelry and decorative items, and while I initially started creating these pieces as a hobby, word of mouth within the club spread, and students began expressing interest in purchasing them.
I decided to officially operate a flea market booth and drew up a plan starting with the school festival. Since it was an independently run market, I determined that recruiting individual sellers was the top priority. I posted a notice on the club’s bulletin board to recruit people who were crafty and eager to showcase their own products. Thanks to this, I was able to recruit about seven sellers, and with a diverse range of items—including jewelry, clothing, scented candles, cosmetics, and hats—coming together, our booth’s product lineup became robust.
The next crucial step was the marketing strategy. I planned a teaser marketing campaign using mannequins. When we dressed and decorated plain mannequins with products made by the sellers and displayed them in the school lobby, passing students stopped in their tracks and reacted with comments like, “What’s that?” and “Those clothes are pretty.” On the day of the flea market, we placed the same mannequins in front of the booths to naturally draw attention.
The teaser marketing successfully piqued consumers’ curiosity, and the remaining factors for success were product quality and practicality.
For the scented candles and cosmetics, we used natural ingredients like essential oils and herbs to promote the concept of “gentle cosmetics for students.” For the clothing, hats, and accessories, we designed them to complement each other, encouraging customers to buy them as sets. Thanks to this planning and execution, we achieved results that led to purchases by visitors, and my sense of responsibility and execution skills as a planner grew significantly.
Examples of Consideration, Sharing, and Cooperation, and My Reflections
As class president during my senior year of high school, I gained experience in class management and conflict resolution. At first, I felt overwhelmed about how to fulfill the role, but I prioritized communication and worked hard to resolve issues. The main problems in the class were seating arrangements and dividing class duties, which I tried to resolve in a fair and considerate manner.
For seating arrangements, we held a class meeting at the beginning of the semester and established a rule to rotate seats monthly via a lottery. However, students with poor eyesight or shorter stature complained that they couldn’t see the blackboard clearly due to the lottery system, and this issue sometimes escalated into conflict when there were no volunteers to take the front seats.
To reduce conflict and minimize discomfort for everyone, I proposed a separate exception rule. I proposed that students with vision below a certain level or those under 160 cm in height participate in a separate lottery for front-row seats, and this rule was adopted after reaching a consensus through a class meeting. We also established detailed rules for the lottery process, such as dividing the class into two groups and conducting the draw within each group. Thanks to this consideration, students who had been experiencing discomfort were able to improve their situation, and it fostered understanding and cooperation among the classmates.
There were also issues regarding club assignments. Since popular clubs had many applicants, it sometimes happened that close friends couldn’t join the same club. Therefore, I proposed that for clubs with excess applicants, we hold another lottery within the club, and give students who didn’t get in the chance to choose another club. By establishing basic rules to ensure fairness while allowing for exceptions, we were able to finalize club assignments without major conflict.
Through this experience as class president, I learned that communication, establishing fair rules, and the flexibility to consider those who are vulnerable are key to resolving conflicts. I realized that leadership is not about coercion, but about fostering consensus and creating an environment where everyone can cooperate.
