Jennifer Newell is an accomplished woman who wears a variety of hats at GCC. She has served as the Dean of Students at GCC for five years now, dedicates her time to coaching the GCC Dance Team, and actively participates as a sorority sister and advisor for GCC’s Alpha Epsilon Gamma (AEG). If that’s not enough to make your head spin, recently she also spent her time speaking to the Professional Sales students. Jennifer focused her presentation on “Sparkle-Tude” and how to create a sparkling attitude everyday.  She used a variety of hilarious anecdotes from her everyday life to drive-home to the students that the negative people and negative situations they face in their everyday lives should not impact their positive attitudes. Jennifer made a point of telling the students that adversity and negativity are not a package deal, saying that “you don’t get a ‘Sparkle-Tude’ if you don’t survive these things.” As cliché as it sounds, the very things that bring you down, can lift you up. Jennifer states that “attitude is everything”, this has been proven through data collected from a nation-wide survey, revealing that an employer would prefer to hire someone with a positive attitude and no skill set over someone with a negative attitude with an accomplished skill set; this is due to the fact that the positive person can be trained to fulfill the job’s requirements. Jennifer delved deep into her presentation, exploring  all seven “Sparkle-Tude” boosters:

1. Start the day off on a positive note.

2. Have only positive thoughts about yourself and others. 

3. Look for the good in yourself and in others. 

4. Believe in yourself, your talents, and unique gifts.

5. Don’t take things personally.

6. Affirm a spirt of gratitude through the day. 

7. Have an unconditional support system and passion/hobbies. 

Jennifer is teaching all of us at GCC how to embrace the positivity in our lives, in order to become a happier and healthier version of ourselves and achieve the goals that satisfy our largest dreams. Jennifer is truly an exemplary member of the GCC community and continues to demonstrate her “Sparkle-Tude” on a daily basis. Now it’s time for the rest of GCC to sparkle with positivity.

-Ami Cornell