Freshman year of
college, Part 2
Quick, before we drop Younger Daughter off for her sophomore
year of college, here’s what she learned during spring semester of her freshman
year.
SECOND SEMESTER
- - - - - Rhetoric
with Bitzer and Burke, Oh my! - - - - -
YD: On to second
semester. I had my Rhetoric class! In which I learned about Bitzer and Burke and
the awesomeness of my T.A. He was so
epic. He was amazingly epic.
Me: (to my Husband) “He was so epic.” That’s what
we have to say about people now.
Husband: Did
you fill out a student evaluation?
YD: I
did. He was also unfortunately the one
who recommended that I go to that speaking competition.
Me: You should
go to the speaking competition.
Husband: No, you shouldn’t.
YD: Thank you, Dad. Thank you for being on my side.
Me: But you speak for the Lorax!
YD: Do I?
Me: Yes! Don’t
you remember when you got the Lorax Award at Girl Scout Camp?!
Husband: The trees have got to learn to stand up for
themselves.
YD: They should grow some roots and a spine!
Me: (pulling us
back from the brink of punanity) So, Rhetoric.
What else?
YD: We learned this whole cool thing about
behavioral interactions. It was this idea that humans can change their opinions
based on who is talking to them and not just based on the facts at hand, and
it’s a really cool thing.
Me: Humans are totally unreasonable. Totally susceptible to influence.
YD: It’s so cool to learn about influence and how
to use it.
Husband: (defiantly):
Not me! You can’t influence me!
YD: It’s actually been proven that that makes you easier to influence.
- - - - - O-Chem, the
overflowing unloved class - - - - -
YD: We had the
second half of the Phages class, in which I learned that it is physically
impossible to make teaching annotation interesting.
O-Chem was a bit of a different thing. I learned that my brother is the most
fantastic amazing older brother in the universe, even though I knew that
already.
[Her brother, while searching for a job as a chemical
engineer, is doing a bang-up job as a tutor in many subjects, science and math. He provided O-Chem tutoring to his sister
gratis.]
The O-Chem professor was so passionate, and so into it! You know, the chemistry department has one of
the smallest group of graduating majors but O-Chem takes up these huge
classrooms because everyone needs it for their bio majors, and none of us want
to be there. That guy was so sweet. I feel bad for him. ….
- - - - - We Heart
Genetics - - - - -
Then we had the Literature of the Americas class, in which I
learned it is relatively easy to sweet-talk your professor if you are actually
interested in what they are saying.
Me: (to my
Husband) Do you concur, Professor?
Husband: No. I
am not subject to influence.
YD: I learned that you really should stop talking
whenever you really didn’t like a book and your professor really liked a book.
At Bell Choir I found that you can have friends and they can
be great people, and then they will graduate.
And then you will have more friends.
Genetics! Genetics is
so cool! I won’t go on a rant like I did
last year. (Nevertheless, YD’s speech pace speeds up and tone goes up with
excitement.) It was just like, like, I love genetics! I love everything to do with the genome!
[There followed a massive, excited speech about genetics.]
…. And we learned about telomeres and all this cool amazing
stuff. It was SOO cool. And I got an A. Which I was very happy with because I was
convinced I was going to get a B.
Me: Okay.
YD: I went
on a rant again. I’m sorry. (happy sigh)
And I continued with my lab work in the second
semester. In which I learned that it is
okay to move on.
Me: What do you
mean?
YD: I mean, even
if you spent a lot of time and effort getting to where you are, it is okay to
move on from it.
- - - - -
And so, Dear Reader, in three days we move on to sophomore year!
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| That bell choir played some pretty complicated music. |
