Week 1 Blog Post

Hello my name is Kiya Hill I am a first year student who is dual enrolled at Linn Benton and Oregon State. I am currently studying Zoology. My career goals are to become a zookeeper or an animal ambassador at a zoo or aquarium or to do research for endangered animals. I choose Linn Benton so that my college tuition costs could be cheaper because I do have to pay for my own college. And as well for the small classes size which are very beneficial because you are able to get help more easily. 

What I am most interested in learning about is how media can positively impact our lives because I feel like you always see ways it can negatively impact lives. But I love media and I think it can be a good thing sometimes and I feel like we need to realize what that is and focus on it so media can be seen in a positive light more. 

One of the things I am passionate about is gymnastics. I did competitive gymnastics for 9 years and I did gymnastics in total for 15 years. So gymnastics has always been and will be my whole life. I am also now a gymnastics coach and I love that I can continue to have my foot in the gymnastics door in such an important aspect of my life. 

I consider my 3 main sources of information the Internet like if I Google something or use ChatGPT, TikTok and some other forms of social media like Instagram and my friends are an amazing source of information as well probably my favorite form. The internet is my go to because it has everything you need right there immediately and it is so easy and convenient. Social media for more kind of like niche things like specific music stuff or like makeup or fashion trends nothing of major importance is found using social media. And then my go to is my friends because most of the time they have knowledge that I do not have so it is good to learn new things from different opinions. I think the Internet is pretty reliable because there a lot of different sources so you can fact check information to make sure that it is accurate. Social media is not very accurate because people like to put a lot of misinformation of there for clout so you have to be careful most of the time. My friends are reliable sometimes but if they have basis on certain things then you aren't getting the whole story so you have to ask a couple people to get the whole version of things sometimes. 

I wouldn't say that I am concerned with fake news and misinformation and stuff. I know that it is out there but I also know how to avoid it so I feel like that is why I am not concerned because I have been trained on how to find misinformation and find reliable sources. I make sure that the information I am intaking is accurate by looking at the author and seeing if they are credible and there experience and then I look at the links provided and same thing there. Then I look at multiple sources to see if the facts line up. I make sure my information is accurate before I pass on any information to other people.