Tristan Wisont

Honors 100: Assignment 5

Portfolio Statement:
For as long as I can remember, the idea of University has been a foreign one an endpoint,
rather than a place to start. From my first year in the Waldorf school, to the rough transfer to a
small public school, to the move to a much larger district, everything has been leading to
graduation; University beyond that was just an abstraction. With University as my present and
near future, Im starting to realize the transitional nature of my time here neither a beginning or
an end.
This first quarter at the University of Washington has been informative and eye-opening for me
on an academic and personal level. Ive faced new and interesting challenges that forced me to
rely on more than just my academics this quarter Ive had to learn what kind of person I am
now and what kind I want to become.
Ive always had high aspirations I want to attend medical school and succeed, along with
thousands of other hopefuls. I want to develop good habits and grow as a person. I want to really
stand out as a student. In the first quarter, I overestimated the ease of transition to this setting and
overcommitted myself academically and in my extracurricular activities. With 18 academic
credits and marching band competing for my time, Ive struggled to identify my priorities and
hold onto the goal of medical school. For such a dream to be possible, I will need to reevaluate
what I value in my time here. I find it very interesting how certain priorities have changed, but
others have not for example, being the top of every class and achieving straight-As is of
diminishing priority to me, replaced by learning as much as possible and not worrying as much
about the grade. Grades are, of course, still important, but they arent my entire focus. I think my
expectations of myself have changed from needing perfection to being able to let some things
go unperfected. The way I seek my goals has also shifted, becoming much slower and
methodical, rather than rapid and frustrated by each obstacle. Im starting to see things in the bigpicture.
A large portion of seeing things in the big picture is knowing the limitations of the immediate
situation and those of the bigger scope. Knowing my limits at each step has been a big part in
shaping how Ive changed over this first introduction to college. In many cases this quarter, I
exceeded my current capacity to manage time. Ive learned that I cant win every battle and that
some battles are better lost. Every time I exceed my limits, I can better define those limits and
take them into account when making future decisions.
The future is a nebulous and undefined situation for me at this point. I have goals for my first
year in Honors to get a grasp of what my scheduling is going to look like and ground myself in
the forum of interdisciplinary learning but those are abstract goals with no definable,
quantitative endpoints. Truly, Im unsure as to what I want to accomplish. However, I know what
I need to accomplish by the end of my time at the University of Washington: I need to have all
the requirements for medical school squared away and be prepared to take the MCAT after senior
year, and I need to be able to look back at my time and say that I grew as a person. Those two
goals are very definable for me, because one is a score and the other is an act of self-reflection.
As I wrap up this reflection, Im compelled to talk about something that really surprised me this
quarter. I said before that University has always been an abstract concept, more of an endpoint
than a starting point as it is sometimes portrayed. Ive started to see it as neither one. To me, this
time is simply a transition from who I have always thought myself to be to who I want to

Tristan Wisont
Honors 100: Assignment 5

become. Its another time of development marking a transition in my life from absorbing
knowledge and letting the world make an impression on me to cementing my worldview and
making my own impression back on the world. Im excited and a little nervous to see where the
transition takes me.