Dear Friends,
Today I went to high school for a college counseling session. Holy crap, these American teenagers have a real road ahead with this college stuff. I can barely understand how to calculate a GPA (ok, technically I actually don't even know how to do that). This was, of course, not for me but for the girl I'm mentoring.
We're now on a quest to try to find her some schools to check out (and I don't necessarily mean physically, just places to read up on and learn about). The thing is, there are SO MANY of them and really the world is open for her. Reading a big book listing the schools doesn't seem the smartest way to go about it when, like her, you can't really define even the qualities you'd want in a school or have a burning passion to be a __________ or study __________. I think she's feeling pressured and overwhelmed and I can't blame her. While I don't know anything about US schools myself, I have been to college and I have a bit of the benefit of hindsight in knowing the sort of un-anticipated factors that really affect how good of an experience it can be for a student.
To try to help her picture what her life at college could be like and to try to open up discussion, I've come up with a list of Twenty Questions. I'd love it if my readers would scan through and tell me if I'm missing anything obvious. I don't really include much about the subjects or majors she might have - I think that'll come. What I'm really hoping to do is document some of her preferences and hope that the counselor can help us come up with a good list to work with that meets her needs and that she'd realistically have a good chance of attending, given her circumstances (which I'm not getting into because I'm not locking down this post).
(with thanks to all those years I spent reading Cosmo quizzes!)
1. What size school do you want to go to?
a) Big (10000+ undergraduate students)
b) Medium (3000-10000)
c) Small (1000-3000)
d) Tiny (<1000)
Considerations re: size -
- what kind of relationship do you want with your professors as an undergraduate?
- how easily do you make friends?
- how well do you deal with bureaucracies?
2. What kind of setting do you want to live in?
a) Big city (e.g. New York, Boston, San Francisco, Chicago)
b) Medium city
i ) suburban setting close to other cities - ease of access to other metropolitan areas (e.g. Raleigh NC)
ii) more rural/outdoors/middle of nowhere (e.g. Boulder CO)
c) College town (i.e. the college is a central part of the life of the town - e.g. Charlottesville VA, Madison WI)
d) Isolated town/school (i.e. the school itself is in the middle of nowhere) or really isn't central to the small town its in)
Considerations re: setting -
- obviously putting yourself in a city gives you access to lots of organizations, cultural and social activities, and people which are not school-related. In a college town, pretty much everything is in some way school-related which can be helpful in terms of just navigating around and feeling part of the area but also claustrophobic if you ever need to just get away.
3. What geographical location would you prefer?
a) East coast
b) West coast
c) Midwest/Central
d) Southeast
e) Southwest
f) Other countries: (name them)
4. What kind of weather do you want?
a) Four seasons, including a "real winter" (with snow!)
b) Warm all the time
c) Middle of the road - cool but not cold, warm but not hot
5. Do you want to go to school with any of your high school friends?
a) Me and my peeps are tight, yo. My posse goes with me.
b) Dude, I hate these people.
c) Eh, I would totally go to a kegger with Biff and Muffy but we, aren't, like awesome buds.
6. What kinds of clubs do you want to join? Or extracurriculars you might like? When you aren't in class what do you expect to do at school?
7. What sports, if any, do you want to play? Do you want to play competitively or just for fun?
8. Do you want to join a sorority - or even if you don't do you want Greek life to be central to the campus social scene?
9. What kind of reputation do you want the school to have?
a) I want everyone to be awed and afraid of the name on my diploma!
b) If everyone has heard of my school I wouldn't want to go there - the more obscure the better.
c) I don't care what anyone thinks of the school, but I want people to know that my program/major was the best in the country.
d) I could care less what anyone thinks about anything.
10. What kind of living situation do you want?
a) I want to live in the dorms for the whole time.
b) I want to live in the dorms if I want, but maybe also move off-campus for my upper years.
c) I don't want to set foot in a dorm.
d) Dorms are okay, whatever, but I want to find a unique place to fit into (e.g. vegan floors, language-based dorms, etc.).
11. What sorts of subjects do you want to study most?
a) Math / physics
b) Physical sciences - biology/chemistry
c) Arts - history/english/sociology
d) Soft sciences - psychology, geography, economics
e) Applied sciences - engineering or computer science
f) Languages
g) Fine arts - music, art
h) Something else...
12. If you go to school outside of northern California, how often do you want to be able to come back and visit?
a) Every chance I get
b) Just at the breaks
c) Never, ever
13. If you have to take on student debt and/or do any work study, how much are you willing to take on?
a) Whatever it takes
b) I don't mind some, but let's be reasonable
c) I want as free a ride as possible
14. Is it important that the student body be diverse?
a) Ethnically
b) Economically
c) Culturally
15. What kind of political viewpoint do you want the school to have?
a) Left-leaning, liberal
b) Radical lefty
c) Moderate - all kinds of viewpoints are represented
d) Conservative
e) Far right leaning or particularly religious
16. What sort of campus groups do you want to dominate campus life (and which ones do you want to hang out with the most)?
a) If only everyone replaced all their light bulbs with polar bears! (politics & activism)
b) That's not 'roid rage, that's my brother! (jocks)
c) Dude, like, I know its Monday but what're we doing this weekend?! (the party crowd)
d) I'm sorry, I can't talk now, I need to get a new pocket protector before the library closes (nerds and brains)
e) Like, ohmigod! I can't believe that Jennifer told Jessica that Melissa totally, like made out with Jeff's friend Jake's brother Brandon!!!!!! (princesses and pretty people)
f) Ola! Bonjour! Arrigato! (students who had to take TOEFL to get in)
g) You've never heard of Red Mustard? They're only the coolest band around. I guess you aren't going to the opening of My Play Is More Obscure Than Yours at the rep either? (band and drama art geeks)
17. What's your goal for going to college?
a) I want to be a ________________ when I grow up and apparently you need a degree for that.
b) I am so interested in ________________ and I want to learn everything I can about it until I am the biggest expert in the world!
c) Two words: PAR-TAY
d) I love going to school and everything about it. I don't have a goal, I just can't get enough of this school stuff.
e) To get the hell out of here. I don't care where I go or what I do, I just want it to be far away from here and some place I can re-invent myself.
f) I have no idea. Everyone says I should though.
18. I'm willing to do ______________ to get into the school I want:
a) whatever it takes - the school is the most important thing and I'll do whatever it takes to go there.
b) the same thing I always do - I want to just do what I want to now until I'm done high school and the right school will be whichever one takes me just as I am
c) some stuff - I mean, okay I'll study a little harder to raise my GPA but I'm not killing myself - I'll end up at the right place in the end
19. Other than the usual (lectures, seminars, labs) I'd like to round out my education by taking advantage of:
a) Independent/self-guided courses
b) Study abroad / foreign exchange programs
c) Work experience or co-op programs / internships
d) Advanced research / research assistantships
e) Designing my own major
f) Alternative / no-grading systems
g) Distance learning
20. I want to spend most of my four years in college:
a) Learning in a classroom
b) Learning from my fellow students
c) Socializing, doing extracurricular activities
d) Networking / making connections with students/faculty
e) Not actually anywhere near the school itself - learning from life while having a place to do laundry
Apparently I didn't have anything better to do today than rearrange furniture in my apartment. The upside is that I think I finally broke my fever. The downside is that all the dust that's been stirred up is hell on my sinuses.
As Lorna mentioned, I am now an Award-Winning LibrarianTM. At the annual meeting of the San Andreas Chapter of SLA, I was given the Mark Baer award. I believe my reaction upon realizing that the person they were talking about was me was "Holy crap!". I probably said that out loud. I did have had some wine with dinner. The idea of winning a "library" award is a bit odd since I think mainly of my librarian-ness as an appendix description of myself.
There's some pretty illustrious company for me on the list of past award winners. Unlike many of them I was awarded it not for a lifetime of librarian godliness (HA); instead, I was given it for my work in getting our chapter up on a blog this year. The actual technical aspects of that weren't exactly difficult - not for a super user blogger like me. No, the real challenge was dealing with people who just didn't seem to get it. I sort of had a hard time with that because it seemed obvious to me that the time was right for us to do this and there really wasn't anything resembling a downside. So it was a challenge to get that "evidence" together and get everyone on board. Or at least, the hell out of the way.
There is still this big list of things I wish we could have done this year - related to the blog or at least our communications technology. But as with all of the optional stuff in one's life sometimes other things get in the way. I'm turning over the chairmanship of the website committee to someone else next year. I'm sure they'll take what I think is a decent foundation and do something really spectacular with it.
(Um, I totally do not have butch hair or abs like in that picture but my boobs are Just. Like. That.)
So, like, I recently bought these pants. They're cotton, wide-legged and really cute (I think). A bit tricky to wear because of the wide leg. But they are so damn comfortable because they're unrestrictive. Anyway, as I wear them today, with my Converse slip-ons, I feel very Jamie Buchman. I remember her always wearing these wide leg black pants with white Keds. Which is, like, sort of horrible but well, I relate. Maybe its the bangs. She also wore lots of denim button down tops and some vests. And, uh, she was kind of a miserable bitch come to think of it. Especially at the end.
I kind of miss that show.
Ok, and this has absolutely nothing to do with what I'm talking about but I like it:
But, frankly, I think this is a better song:
I've been looking for a very specific clip but can't find it, so instead I'll just give you this for now:
This photo should give you some idea how insane my week here at work has been:
