In this way, college adds a new aspect to the game of life. Not only are grades competitive like in high school, but now this new aspect of what classes you get on what times you get them is another source of competition. When we first get these registrar emails, do you guys feel competitive over what date you have with your friends and other students? Do you guys immediately run to a computer to check? Is it more important the time of the class or the subject of the class?
Saturday, March 31, 2012
Backpacking
In the University of Michigan, backpacking is a stressful event for every student on campus. While some students care more about the academic content of their backpacks, others are more worried about having no friday classes and no class before 11 am. When the first email comes out from the University of Michigan Registrar announcing that backpacking is now "open", students immediately run to wolverine access and the LSA course guide to try to create the perfect schedule for the next semester. It all becomes a game and a competition of who has the earliest registration date, and who can make the best schedule with the classes they need to take. The worst is when some students are so happy with their schedule that they post their perfect schedule on Facebook for all the students with later registration dates to see. In a sense, having a late registration date automatically titles you as a loser. Then of course, we all have to compare when our registration dates are and argue over how they pick the registration dates. The people with early registration dates argue that the date is picked primarily by the amount of credits a student has, and the people with the late registration dates argue that it is completely "random".
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Ali,
ReplyDeleteI really enjoyed this post because it describes the exact feelings and frustration I feel around registration time. I actually checked wolverine access at 12:04, 4 minutes after our registration dates were open. Immediately after, I texted my friends to figure out when there date was so I could compare it to mine and see if I was early or late. I think I have definitely gotten caught up in the competition associated with registration dates, but that is not what it used to be about for me. Registration time used to give me anxiety because I was nervous I was not going to get the classes that I thought were interesting, it was about missing out on material I wanted to learn. The fact that this could then turn into an all out competition to see if I got an earlier registration date is pretty unfortunate. Furthermore, it is definitely a negative aspect at the University of Michigan. Because it is such a big institution, many students feel pressured not only in classes competing with others for top grades, but also in picking classes, something that used to be so mundane and purely about a quest for knowledge and nothing else. What does it say about Michigan that this is happening? Then again, due to the large amount of students attending this institution, I am not quite sure I would have a solution to create a way where students don't have to feel such competition and anxiety when picking classes. Does anyone have any ideas or solutions?
Taylor Rothman
I have never felt this kind of competitiveness to the degree that you displayed in your post, but I do immediately try to backpack the best possible schedule for me. I just think it sucks that there are so many factors preventing people from taking that class that they have always wanted to take. Between filling out meaningless distribution requirements, classes filling up, class time conflicts and early unreasonable start times, it is not always possible to get the exact classes or schedule that you always want... which sucks!
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