Oberlin Blogs

Add/Drop Fun, As Usual

September 12, 2010

Zoe McLaughlin ’11

Every semester, I think that I'm really playing the add/drop game. This semester, it's still true, but in a different way. Instead of going to classes that I wanted to take but wasn't registered for, I went to classes that I was registered for, with the intention of dropping two of them. To fulfill graduation requirements, everyone has to take nine credit hours in the natural sciences, the social sciences, and the humanities. Natural sciences and humanities were easily covered with my two majors, but I still need two more social science credits.

At the start of last week, I was registered for International Politics, Archaeology, and Sociology. By yesterday, I'd dropped all but one of them, leaving me with my schedule for this semester:

Introduction to Archaeology--Amy Margaris
I've gone to the first day of this class at least two, if not three times. This time, I'm actually staying. Recently, I had a revelation that what I'm really interested in, as far as chemistry is concerned, is actually not organic chemistry. No. In fact, it's the applications of analytical chemistry, particularly when analytical chemistry is used to learn more about history. I can't tell you more than that, since I literally had this revelation about four days ago, but it has made me even more excited for this class.

Chemical and Statistical Thermodynamics--Manish Mehta
I will not lie to you. I am terrified for this class. On Friday, we had a brief "review" of some calculus concepts that I had never learned. I'm going to have to spend a lot more time "reviewing" said concepts on my own, and then this class is going to be all about applying them. But, as usual, we'll see how it goes. I'll let you know.

Performance, Collaboration, and Interdisciplinary Approaches to Poetry--Kazim Ali
This class looks like it's going to be crazy fun. Basically, it's about presenting poetry in ways other than just written out on the page. I have some crazy ideas running around in my head about setting poems to compositions of music. I had those same crazy ideas my senior year of high school, when I took music theory, but I did not use them when we composed a piece at the end of the year. Maybe it's time to resurrect them now...

Nonfiction Workshop--Lynn Powell
I've been trying to get into the nonfiction workshop in the creative writing department since I started applying for workshops. I'm so excited to have finally gotten in. It's going to be a lot of work, I can tell already, but I also hope to produce a lot of really good material. And along with that, I hope I can come up with good things to write about.

Besides these things, I'll be doing research again (details about that forthcoming), participating/running College Orchestra (which takes a lot more time than I ever thought it would), participating in CSA, dancing, and doing lots of other things that I am not going to list right now. Life is already insanely busy, but that's what makes it fun! (It's best if that last sentence is read with a note of hysteria in one's voice.)

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