The President's Salute to Undergraduate Academic Achievement
I attended this event last night at the Fawcett Center, with my guest of honor Dr. Sebastien Knowles, Dept. of English. (Every student honoree got to invite one faculty member to join them for dinner; I had to share Seb with another student, but that's all right.) Despite the slight irony of taking the university's best students away from their studies for three hours, the program was really quite nice. President Gee made a cameo appearance but had to race off to yet another engagement, though he did shake my head during the reception beforehand! After dinner, in which not one but two well-meaning waiters offered me enormous helpings of meat despite the yellow vegetarian tag at my place (um, no, I did not change my mind about my dietary habits in the past five minutes!), we had a few remarks from Michael Jaung, who is truly one of the most outstanding students I have ever met at this university, and Executive Vice President and Provost Joseph Alutto. Then we had some really neat presentations from the Foreign Language Center, including a Hindi love poem, a Swahili folk tale, and an ASL rendition of Carmen, Ohio. Finally, Professor Dick Davis presented all the honorees with a copy of his latest book, a translation of a Persian love poem, Vis and Ramin, which I actually think is exceedingly cool. All in all, it was a nice way to end an otherwise blah sort of day.
...but my Microbiology 520 class is too easy. Well, maybe not so much too easy as almost entirely redundant. We spent the first five weeks covering a total of about two chapters, all of which I have already learned in Biochem 511 and even AP Biology (i.e. Bio 114/115). The second half will be devoted to genetic elements, replication, transcription, translation, exchange of genetic information and mutations, which, last time I checked, is, oh right!, my entire major. I would be very interested in learning the finer points of bacterial genetics, but as this is a general course, I doubt we will get beyond the basic mechanisms. I am pretty disappointed with this class and wonder why the molecular genetics department accepts it as an elective when all the material is covered by other, required major classes. I wish I had taken Virology, Advanced Microbial Genetics or even Food Microbiology instead. I figure if I'm going to spend time in class I want to be learning something new and exciting, not rehashing the same things I learned in high school.
Monday morning I had three needles stuck in my arms before 9:00 in the morning. Why? A minor phenomenon I call College-Kid-Checkup-Syndrome, which is characterized by piling all one's various medical appointments into one big gulp, or as few big gulps as possible. Even though my home is only twenty minutes away, it can be difficult getting there to see all my doctors. I have timed my twice-annual dentist cleanings to fall exactly during spring break and the day or two before classes start in the fall. My eye appointments are usually scheduled for the summer. I have to get monthly allergy shots, however, and sometimes it's quite a task juggling those so they fall on weekends when I can go home.
So Monday I had scheduled a physical, since I haven't had one since graduating high school and leaving my pediatrician's office. (Though I did go back to get my flu shot there, garnering a lot of funny looks in the waiting room as people tried and failed to figure out where my screaming toddler was.) I decided to go ahead and squeeze in my allergy shot too, since I was already at home for the physical. At the doctor's office, I ended up getting a tetanus booster and some blood drawn for blood work. Those are the three needles I mentioend earlier. Recall that this is after I literally ran around all day Sunday picking up trash at the 'Shoe, working out, and generally racing around like a crazy woman.
Around 1:00 Monday afternoon my body finally said, "No. I quit. You pushed too hard, I'm done. You're on your own." This resulted in me being physically unable to fully rouse myself after what was supposed to be a half hour nap. This would have been fine if I hadn't had a midterm to take in half an hour. I managed to wrestle myself out of bed and stagger to class, at which point I no longer cared about electroreception in fish (oh wait, I never did) but still managed to write a few decent paragraphs about it.
I feel much better now, except that I haven't really started studying for Friday's microbiology midterm. But at this point I'm just glad not to feel like a zombie.
Today was Get on the Ball, hosted by Chimes Junior Class Honorary. One of the perils of scheduling anything spring quarter is the sheer volume of concurrent events. Today we had some very stiff competition in the form of the spring game, but we did have fairly good turnout nonetheless. We had free food from Raising Cane's, a DJ, and some really nice raffle prizes, if I may say so myself, including a watch from Buck-I-Zone, a football signed by Archie Griffin, and gift cards to Dick's, Barnes and Noble, Eddie George's Grille 27 and Buffalo Wild Wings, among others.
I went to see the academic advisor in the College of Education today to get some information about the Master's of Education program. I needed to make some substitutions of content courses I will need for licensure, and it's a good thing I checked because there were three courses I had plain forgotten about taking since they weren't listed on my Honors Contract. This would not have affected my bachelor's degree, but I would have had to take the courses at some point before getting my teaching license and master's degree. I would definitely prefer to have all my content courses under my belt before starting graduate studies.
I cannot stress enough the importance of doing your own homework when it comes to course planning. As I've juggled two Honors Contracts (but fortunately only one set of GEC's) and the content requirements for teacher licensure, I've become nearly religious in scheduling my classes. Too many times have I seen people discover, to their severe chagrin, that they need just one more class to graduate...and it is only offered once a year. That means an extra quarter and extra tuition. Not pretty.
The advisors here on campus do not get paid nearly enough to chase you with a broom toward your diploma. It is entirely your responsibility to make sure you are taking the classes you need at the appropriate time. When you decide on a major, keep a copy of the department's undergraduate handbook, and download a copy of the college's GEC requirements as well. Consult these every time you schedule; if you have an Honors Contract, follow it or make modifications as necessary. People always complain about OSU screwing them over in terms of scheduling, and yes, it is difficult competing against 50,000 students to get into a class. But being informed and paying attention could eliminate many problems that cannot be blamed on the university.
My mol gen professor shared this tidbit with us today:
Apparently that's what happens when the entire genetics department of Stanford gets stoned in the 70s. I promise that OSU's department is not (quite) this insane.
1. A curious melange of winter coats and flip-flops as the temperature gyrates between 40 and 75 degrees Fahrenheit. In one day.
2. A sudden surfeit of cleavage on the Oval: toe, butt, and the traditional kind.
3. An abundance of flying objects on all grassy surfaces: Frisbees, footballs, the occasional freshman.
4. An unprecedented depletion of sidewalk chalk at all local retailers.
5. A distinctly earthy new aroma on the buses and other tight spaces.
6. The descent of my schedule book into inhuman chaos.
A pagan, a Mormon, two Christians, and a spiritually undecided student sit down in Postle Hall and discuss religion, UWeekly, and Facebook. One of them turns out to be the photographer for UWeekly's Fashion Police and the writer of Question of the Week. (I also now know which area of campus to avoid if I'm having a bad fashion day.) She had overheard my conversation with my friend and accountability partner and had some questions about religion. The conversation blossomed to include the other people and topics mentioned above.
Incidents like this are, bar none, my favorite part of life at OSU. Of course, it's not right for everyone. I just talked to a friend who transferred to OSU Lima after two quarters on main campus, and she sounds about a million times happier to be at a smaller campus and closer to her family (and away from some drama here in town). But I do love meeting all sorts of new people, even if most of my close friends are admittedly from similar backgrounds as mine. Everyone has something to say and if there's one thing I love, it's a good story.
