Webinar Field Placements are just… Pointless…
Tags: College Related, Autism, Social Service Work

What I’ve seen and experienced during my time as a previously third semester Social Service Work student

As an SSW student who finished their third semester, I hated how my peers were suffering from unnecessary assignments that no one asked for all along. With the amount of emotional agony that they’ve experienced, as I’ve also seen in an SSW support chat. And yes, I admit that I am a part of it.

One of my peers even expressed that she needs the “holy spirit” after this semester, to which I responded to her with planning on being “nocturnal” since I was used to pulling some actual all-nighters in terms of getting some work done.

One of my peers (let’s refer to her as J for privacy reasons) even expressed that she never wanted to have one of my professors ever again “ON GOD”, as she said in a WhatsApp group chat that I am also in. J also told me that I was a real one, and that was one time when I was helping others become caught up with their work based on photos of my work, which helped them a lot. And I am willing to do that again since I hate seeing my classmates, peers, and friends suffer from my college’s bullshit.

I will share one of my experiences, but as I’ve said earlier, I encourage y’all to share any experiences in terms of dealing with webinar-based field placements or with any bullshit that y’all have dealt with that is assignment-related while in college.

I remember one time that I stayed up late with J while we were both doing our own learning contract assignments. I was also listening to typing ASMRs (as referred to by the online Merriam-Webster Dictionary, it is an “Autonomous Sensory Meridian Response”. This response is usually described as perceiving a “tingly feeling” that goes from the head in a downward direction. Some individuals experience as a response to certain sounds, for example, crinkling paper, soft whispering, a gentle touch, one’s hair being brushed, moans while also listening to low-fidelity music, which emotes a sense of beauty and aesthetics.

Low-fidelity is not what you are looking for if you are exam cramming, or cramming in terms of getting assignments done the night or before the due date of assignments. Now for that, you need the metal variety, in which case being low-fidelity or high fidelity matters not, as it’s all about the pounding power of volume that you need to to keep you alert and driven.

I also remember staying up late to try to finish the assignment… However, I began to have a quiet emotional breakdown as it was early in the morning when this happened and my family were still asleep, unknown to what I was doing during the night/early morning. I texted J on WhatsApp about it, and she reassured me throughout my quiet emotional breakdown about it along with the unexpected changes that happened in this hellhole of a year because of the COVID-19 pandemic. Just before sunlight, I was finished with having my quiet emotional breakdown, so I decided to nap so that I would gather more energy and strength to get my assignment done.

I n the morning, I got up to make some oatmeal with Matcha (or green tea) powder. I made sure to have some nutritional fuel first before I finished my assignment, finally! I handed it in on the day that it was due, and although I was happy on the outside, on the inside I was feeling overjoyed with a sense of accomplishment. Despite obstacles, I finishing that assignment, and in diligently doing so, I learned valuable lessons that will always stay with me in the days to come.