The fun in registering for classes

Posted on April 9, 2013 by Robert

Every year, once each semester, students go through one of the most traumatic and exasperating experiences of college: class registration. Maybe that was an over exaggeration, but most students will complain that this time of year is rough. If it wasn’t hard enough that you have to pick a major and do well in school, you have to get a spot in each of the classes you want. The experience isn’t limited to just McDaniel either, students at all other colleges go through the same stress.

For me, this year’s registration snuck up on me. Earlier this semester I had decided to drop my Spanish major and just stick with an English major in order to open up my future schedule for the exploration of other subjects. Looking at the program requirements for each of the minors I wanted to accomplish, as well as the rest of the classes I needed to complete for my major and the McDaniel Plan the road before me seemed a bit daunting. So who do you turn to for guidance? Your advisor!

Advisors are special academic advice gurus that you select in your major who help you pick classes and stay on course with all major, minor, and McDaniel plan requirements. I’ve been gifted a wonderful advisor, Dr. Mary Bendel-Simso of the English department. This semester, the past three actually, she has helped me completely reconfigure my plan. First, to be a English and Spanish double major with a minor in Education, then just simply an English and Spanish major, and now finally an English major with minors in Political Science, Spanish, and (hopefully!) writing.

Though some students come to McDaniel knowing exactly what they want to do, there are definitely more of us who wing it and see where we end up. I’m in the second semester of my sophomore year and I still might pull of a major with a triple minor so there’s really no rush to choose. The comfort is knowing that even if I don’t end up sticking to this plan, Dr. Mary will be there with me to figure it all out and make it work.

In the meantime, I got all the classes I wanted this semester which is a first (don’t be discouraged freshmen, it gets easier) with the exception of the Yogacore PE class I wanted to take, but I’m waitlisted and those always end up letting you in eventually. Anyway I feel like I’ve finally gotten myself on to the right track in terms of what I’m studying.

Interviewing Strangers

Posted on February 15, 2013 by Cassie

Besides being an English major, I’m also pursuing a minor in Writing as well as Journalism. Last semester, I interned with the Baltimore Sun’s Features department and got a taste for what it would be like after I graduated. To put it simply, I was terrified. After I got over my fear of driving into Baltimore during rush hour, I concentrated on just keeping up with the day to day projects. But as I was just beginning my Journalism minor, I was unprepared for interviewing people on the spot.

Small talk is not my forte with strangers. I listened a little too well to my mother when I was younger about not talking to them. I felt like I was intruding when I would call people and ask them questions, even if they weren’t personal. To make matters worse, I had a night class last semester, Intro to Journalism, where I had to do the same thing. To complete my minor, I needed to take Adv. News Reporting (Intro 2.0 basically).

Every week we have to create a new article, prepping, researching and interviewing for it. While for my first article I based it on the Vagina Monologues and the process of creating a student-led, volunteer production, my second is about student-jobs on campus and the workers’ relations to the rest of campus. To say I was nervous is putting it mildly. As I said, I don’t converse well with strangers, but this was somehow worse. These were people that I saw around campus, that served me food or helped me fetch books, people that I interacted with regularly. Would they shut me down? Would they laugh at me?

I approached each person warily, starting with general questions. But no one seemed to notice the awkwardness I expected. No one laughed or stopped me. In fact, they made jokes to lighten the mood. McDaniel students and workers alike were jovial, helpful, and surprised me. My class work technically depended all on them, but they came through. McDaniel Campus, though small, is a closeknit community at heart. The small size allows for us to be connected to everyone with only a few degrees of seperation. We can depend on that, even when we least expect it.

Native American Art

Posted on February 2, 2013 by Kaitlyn Vadenais

This semester I am taking my first ever art class to fulfill one of my McDaniel Plan requirements.

I did such a great job avoiding them, as art isn’t exactly my forte, for three and a half years. For my creative expression requirement, while other people were taking ceramics, drawing, or jewelry making, I took a creative writing class.

However, I have my first class in Peterson, our “clean arts” building on campus. I am taking Native American art, in order to become a well-rounded student. Although this is not a class I am taking out of extreme interest, it fit in my schedule and I am taking it with one of my roommates so it shouldn’t be too bad.

The best contrast in classes like this one are the combination of students and their interests. My classmates are divided into one of two groups: those are here for an art related major or minor, and those who are here to graduate.

I am learning a lot just from the art students in my class, and I am quite impressed with their knowledge and the information that they know. As I sit staring at the art, just enjoying the lines and colors, my fellow classmates know what certain symbols mean and what it says about the culture.

I am looking forward to seeing where I stand on Native American art upon completing this course.

Midterm Grades…Dun Dun Dun

Posted on October 22, 2012 by Whitney Walker

Midterms is always the week were everyone instantly forgets everything they have learned so far in the semester. It’s like when you see a car coming at you and you just freeze up and forget what you are supposed to do. But what is worse that getting hit by a car? Getting hit by a bus. And that bus would have to be Midterm grades. It is never fun to be hitting refresh on your computer a million times waiting for your grades to show up. Most teachers are nice enough to send you an e-mail to warn you that grades have been posted. The longest ten seconds of my life are when I have clicked the “ok” button and am waiting for my grades to show up. I always have an idea of what I’m going to get and then a million different scenarios run through my head. Did I forget to turn in a paper? Have I missed too many classes? Have I participated in class enough? How much is that bad test grade going to affect my score?
When my grades finally appear my first reaction is usually, “how did that happen?!” Sometimes it is good and sometimes it is bad. Either way, I always ask myself how. This semester, after all the stressing over last week, I found myself pleased with more of my grades than disappointed with them. This was a comforting feeling because it makes me feel like I really have a grip on the material I am learning in these classes. There was one class that worried me a little. The grade what lower than I had expected so I immediately contacted my professor to ask for help. She comforted me and told me it wasn’t the most accurate score because of the way the assignments are falling this semester. This made me feel better about it and I feel like I am capable of getting the grade I think I deserve in that class by the end of the semester.
Professors are super helpful when grades come out. They are the best person to talk to if you have struggling in a class because they are the ones who understand better than anyone if you are really understanding the concepts and putting forth the amount of work needed to get a good grade. They want to see their students succeed so they will help you in any way they have to, to make sure thahappens. The professors at McDaniel are 100% more helpful than the ones I had at my high school. This is very important because in college you aren’t just going to class to get good grades but you are going to class to learn the skills you will need in the real world in order to be a successful adult.

It’s important to take a break sometimes too…

Posted on October 15, 2012 by Robert

Fall Break means changing leaves, beautiful Fall weather, time with family, and, most importantly, a break from the stress and rigor of school. For me it meant homework, studying, reading, and, most importantly, becoming a recluse so that I wouldn’t fall any further behind in my classes than I already had. I spent Friday and Saturday on campus, and after deciding that I really did miss my parents enough that I had to go home, I through my laundry and my books into my car and drove home.

Anyone will tell you that since Fall Break falls right after midterms, their homework load is usually pretty light. Teachers give students a temporary breather before slamming them in the second half of the semester between homework and eventually finals. I was less than enthused that I had such a heavy homework load, and was not the best guest to my family since I spent most afternoons locked in my room working. Then I realized that I had a sizable presentation due on the history of Wine due on the first day back from break, which added greatly to my stress. I felt alone in my struggle, especially since I didn’t have any of my school friends nearby to lean on.

Thanks to the invention of Skype, I managed to get unite virtually the friends with whom I was working on the presentation. I had expected that I would largely be leading the assignment since that is the way these things go, but each of them told me they had been doing a little bit of work on theirs all along and were finishing them up and even offered to help me do my portion of the project. I was overjoyed but still had a lot to do. At this point my friend Barney texted me and told me that he and my friends Kyle, Carleigh, and Nicole were down in my area and going rollerblading and that I should take a break and join him. After some hesitation I decided that I would rely on the help of my peers in getting the assignment done and allow myself a break.

What a great choice that was. It’s nice when a community, like the one at McDaniel, is so much a part of your life that you’re a part of it even when you’re an hour away. Thanks to my friends I too was able to have a Fall Break too, I was even reminded by Barney to spend my final day at home with my parents instead of with my laptop which was a much needed. I was reminded that while the family I have at home is important to me, the family I have at McDaniel is equally important, possibly more so, because they keep me grounded when I forget what is important. I don’t recommend falling behind on your assignments, but it’s important to realize that working yourself to death is no way to live.

Learning at McDaniel/when your scheduling isn’t enuf

Posted on October 11, 2012 by Robert

The recent focus in my Literature by Women class has been plays. In the past two weeks among many plays, I have read two excellent plays that particularly caught my attention; each author depicting a different color in the struggles of African American women in the 1960s. A Raisin in the Sun by Lorraine Hansberry is about an African American family struggling to achieve a greater life than their two bedroom apartment in the city of Chicago. Then for colored girls who have considered suicide/when the rainbow is enuf by Ntozake Shange (technically a choreopoem) is a montage of women in the 1970s who relate their traumatic pasts in verse form in the hopes of giving a voice to women who have felt forced to remain in silence.

Now ask any of my friends and they would tell you that I hate each and every one of my classes this semester, which is true for the most part. And it is here that I would like to add a side note: no matter how tempting it seems to schedule all your classes on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays and then use Tuesday and Thursday to get your work done – DON’T DO IT! It’s a trap and I fell into it. Trust the kid at the bottom of the rabbit hole: you’re better off not taking this adventure. Back on topic – for a play to catch my attention this semester makes the play pretty good. It is, in fact, these plays that have restored my faith in my educational pursuit of a major in English.

A Raisin in the Sun presents a strong female character in Mama who has become the head of the family due to her husband’s death. She controls the finances as her husband’s insurance check is coming to her now that she has retired, and a conflict ensues as she decides how to divide up the cash. My class had a movie night on the first floor of Hill Hall to watch the play performed. We were allowed to show up in PJs and bring popcorn and just relax and enjoy a film with our classmates, and not only did we learn a lot about the play as well as the struggle of an African American woman in the mid-twentieth century; but we had a great time doing it.

This experience was good, but nothing could beat the second movie night we had to watch for colored girls…. Though the opinion of the class was that the movie did not do justice to the choreopoem, I loved it. At present I’m having trouble remembering the last time I was so moved by any piece of work. Though there is no protagonist, the character I empathized with the most was the Woman in Red whose ex-boyfriend gave her two bastard children and then killed them when she would not marry him. Of course guys don’t cry, but I did feel tears roll down my face as I watched this woman lament so deeply the cruelty that was her life. These experiences are important in education and I was pleased to be able to reflect on them with my fellow classmates today in class.

Education at McDaniel comes in many forms, but perhaps the most valuable part of this education is the learning that comes from getting together with peers and experiencing first hand what you discuss in class. We could have read these plays over and over in class, but without movie nights on the first floor of Hill Hall, these would just be two more books that I read that one time in that class that I think was called Lit by Women but I don’t remember.

Collaborative Learning

Posted on October 3, 2012 by Jess Hague

Tonight, in my education class, I had to teach a 15-minute reading-based lesson to the other students in my class. I never thought that teaching a class full of teachers would be so intimidating! While I was very nervous to receive criticism, however constructive, from my peers, I did not realize how helpful it would be to hear their ideas. Throughout the night, we each got up and presented our reading lessons. I enjoyed seeing all of the different ideas that a room full of Secondary English teachers comes up with when the only thing they’re told they have to do is teach a reading-based lesson that meets the teaching standards. We had a wide variety of lesson that were taught that ranged from using context clues to discussing logos to using thinking maps to help organize thoughts.

The coolest thing about teaching this lesson to my class was that it was a trial run for me, since I will actually be teaching an 80-minute lesson to my freshman students next week. My lesson was about thinking maps that students would use to help them summarize articles from newspapers, which ultimately could be applied to any text that they read. I only taught my education class one portion of the lesson, since it was a shorter amount of time and then just explained what I would do for the rest of the lesson. Thanks to the feedback from my peers, I was able to gather ideas that I will be able to use when I teach the lesson to my actual class. I would have never thought of having a note sheet for my students to use while I was teaching my lesson. The feedback was very constructive, and I believe that it will help me to teach a better lesson to my students. I am also hoping that these ideas will allow my students to comprehend more.

Not only have I learned that I should not be nervous to teach to my peers, since they will be able to help me find new ways to teach my students, I should also be grateful for the types of classes we have at McDaniel. If I was at a large university, I never would have the opportunity to be in a class that is so discussion-based and allows students to get feedback on everything that we do. I have learned to love the small class sizes at McDaniel because they allow a much more personal feel to classes.

My First Day of Class

Posted on August 27, 2012 by Annie Brown

Today was the first day of class! Unfortunately (to me), my first class wasn’t until 1:50 this afternoon, so when people asked me at lunch how my classes were, I wasn’t able to give them an answer! (And because I also have an evening class on Mondays, my answer to that question was pretty much the same at dinner.)

I guess it’s not such a bad thing that I had to wait for my first class though. I actually got up at around 8:30 this morning to work on unpacking more of my things and to go print out some course materials at the library. After a little downtime, I went to Decker to check out the annual Welcome Week poster sale and then had lunch with a couple of friends in Glar.

On my way back to my dorm from lunch, I stopped by the brand new Center for Experience and Opportunity (CEO), which is still under construction, and was able to say hi to Jim Mayola, who officially is CEO’s Associate Director of Student Employment and Employer Relations. (I know him better as the really awesome and helpful guy who worked for what used to be Career Services on campus.) It was nice to chat with him, as it is to chat with a lot of people on campus, and because I told him that I had class right when CEO would be giving away cupcakes in Kriel Lounge by Glar, he let me have one early.

At 1:50, I finally had my first class, Grammar and Usage. The instructor is very friendly and enthusiastic, and I think it’s going to be a great class. I’m an English major, but grammar was my first “love” within the realm of English, so between that and the fact that I’m actually pretty good at math, I think things are going to go smoothly.

After class number one, I stopped to chat informally with my adviser, English professor Dr. Becky Carpenter. Becky was my First Year Seminar (FYS) professor last year for a class called Gender, Literature, Culture. She’s a wonderful professor and person, and I was glad to be able discuss my summer and other random things with her.

My afternoon didn’t end there! After I left Hill Hall, where the English department is located, I returned to the poster sale to continue to look through posters, and this time, I left with three. My walls are so much more cheerful with the new posters, but I still need to hang up all the smaller wall decorations I collected over the past year. (Not to mention, I still need to finish unpacking!) I also walked to Rite Aid to get some things that I had left at home and managed not to pick up at Target. Rite Aid is easily within walking distance of campus, but the trip there seemed longer than I remembered; it must have been the heat. From Rite Aid, I went straight to dinner at Glar, which I left 20 minutes before my next and final class of the day.

My evening class is called “The Hero’s Journey,” and it’s taught by psychology professor Paul Mazeroff, who after one class, I can already tell is a great professor and person. The class is my SIS, which stands for Sophomore Interdisciplinary Studies. Similar to how all McDaniel freshmen are required to take a First Year Seminar, all sophomores on campus are required to take an SIS. The Hero’s Journey takes a look at the concept of the hero’s journey throughout myth and storytelling while also introducing concepts in psychology developed and made famous by Carl Jung. Though having a class that’s over three hours long is a little brutal, given the content of the course and the great professor, I think I can survive my first ever evening class!

In the meantime, I’m pretty tired after my first day, so I’m going to go easy on the homework tonight and try to go to bed as early as possible. There will be plenty more time to unpack tomorrow, and with two more classes to attend for the first time, I’m looking forward to what day two has in store!

Stories from the Hill

Tag Archives: Classes