I forget to write over and over again. But hey! I have something now! I promise that I’ll like. Try to at least make this a weekly habit, just for myself...
This is a stream of consciousness loosely organized by “necessity”, whispered into the void.
Classes
You can search online to find what the numbers mean. JP1/2 are the japanese classes, the only classes that I felt I could truly come in to most days and enjoy.
Overall I’ve been disappointed; it’s worse than the instruction I got in high school. I’m not even sure I want to cover this that much.
Teaching college is hard, but ultimately the issues are a strict subset of those for why teaching kids is hard. There's no reason it can't at least be better than 10th grade.
One HS teacher has about one hour of instruction per day with ~150 students. That’s comparable to a lecture hall.
Teachers don’t have an enormous army of teaching assistants to grade and answer questions.
Students are, at least more often, attending the class because they want to. They also generally care about their grade so they’ll do the work you give.
Yet things just don’t go well. Lectures are confusing, boring, and annoying, sometimes all at once. Tests are evil, bad enough to make me quite literally try to bite off my skin while the circuits professor circles around slowly as I ask, confused, about this op-amp integrator. Curving, while banned, is essentially forced. Professors and students distrust each other and assume bad intentions. There’s very few guardrails for struggling students, and those that do try are met with assignments that favor the exact opposite type of student: one that can coast off of prior intuitions and spent one-tenth the effort.
Someday I’ll write a more in-depth post; for now I can’t stand it to the point that my second major went from computer science -> electrical engineering -> none in the span of about three classes.
Extracurriculars
My second year of choir was great! I don’t really remember too much, but I highly recommend joining one. Ryan (our conductor) is amazing. We just did Michael Tippet’s A Child of Our Time and although the modern parts were, fine, sometimes fun to sing, the adapted African American spirituals that tied the piece together were generally breathtaking. One of my favorite memories from the year was a guest lecturer who worked with us specifically on those spirituals; I think it was the first time I understood how important (and impactful!) experts in niche academic subjects are.
Next Sing (the low effort, [pick what you want to sing and then sing it once a week and then perform] acapella group that I am super attached to) was also incredible, but absolutely chaotic. I was asked to arrange a beginner/intermediate act in late August and have it ready by early September; of course, I both procrastinated and picked the song Henceforth which was obviously too fast with an impossible motif. I also sucked at leading an act, to the point I would be consistently mocked: for my inability to make decisions about tempo or dynamics, or the many mistakes in my score, etc. But I’m way more comfortable act leading and arranging, so it was worth it.
During the spring semester I was “elected” the co-president, which really meant doing basic housekeeping tasks while the competent co-president actually went out and did things. However it also meant that I had way more attachment to the concert going well, beyond just being in too many acts; I was so endlessly grateful that it went beyond my wildest expectations but the stress really, REALLY got to me. It’s hard being emotionally attached to a person but it’s way, WAY harder to be attached to an event. Long story but someday I want to tell it.
Next Sing is always incredible; it reminds me that you can have no experience in something and just. Have fun.
I did a couple of other structured extracurriculars: tutoring for an algorithms class; trying out dance, but I honestly didn’t find them that important. Maybe I'll say something later.
New Life Stuff
I had no meal plan the first semester so I “meal prepped”, which meant making six-ish meals in two hours every monday afternoon and eating that throughout the week. It was not a great idea, but at least I can make a couple edible versions of stir-fry. I do want to try cooking beyond my comfort zone some day, though.
I went out and explored a few more random stops in Boston, but this was not nearly as productive of a train station spedrun year as last year, where I would often walk around some random neighborhood for a couple hours just because I could. I don’t know if that’s a good or bad thing.
I got a Brompton! It’s comfortable, has a fun design, and I love the looks I get when I roll my grocery basket as a bike into the Trader Joe’s. (Like this.) However, it’s so expensive I’m constantly afraid it gets stolen and it needs repairs already, so I don’t know how permanent of a biking solution this is.
In the fall I ran ten straight-ish miles but then in the spring I kinda fell out of running shape :(
I started having surrealish late night chats with people, which I feel like is a hallmark college experience. It’s great to play insane Concentration 64 games at 3am. On the other hand it is nice to get more than 4 hours of sleep before your circuits final.
There were intense struggles too, but I don’t think I have anything coherent to say about those, yet. At least I can say that when I feel good, the struggle makes sudden spring heat a bit sweeter, but when I feel terrible, I wish I’d just taken three classes and lived a simple life instead. 'tis life, but I do wish I had a better grasp of not freaking out half the time about something.
