The Mirror 08/08/14

8.8.2014

MIRROR

A MaJOR MIX-UP| 2

A Day In the life | 3

Home Sweet...Hanover? | 3

bucket list busting| 4 ZONIA MOORE // THE DARTMOUTH STAFF

2// MIRROR

EDITOR’S NOTE

A Major Mix-up story

ZONIA MOORE// THE DARTMOUTH STAFF

About two weeks into my Dartmouth career, some friends and I heard about a little thing called The Fifty. We immediately signed up to support and had an incredible time helping older Dartmouth students as they tested their limits. Watching The Fifty hikers struggle through the night — completely of their own free will and often with little advanced preparation — was the first thing about Dartmouth that really showed me just how much our school and surroundings makes possible. As cliché as it sounds, those of us at Dartmouth don’t think, we just do, when it comes to challenging ourselves and experiencing everything that the Upper Valley has to offer.

There’s never been a better time to do that than sophomore summer, and yet the pressure to do so much before the weather starts to get cold again and our friends head off to faraway countries and internships sometimes can make it feel like you’ve hardly done anything “sophomore summery” at all. Regardless of how you’ve spent this summer, don’t worry — we’ve got two more years to discover this place and keep telling ourselves we’ll actually do a sunrike.

And to all of your embarking on The Fifty today, best of luck!

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MIRROR R MIRROR EDITOR LINDSAY KEARE

EDITOR-IN-CHIEF LINDSAY ELLIS PUBLISHER CARLA LARIN

B y Maggie shields

Now that we’re sophomores, we have all declared a major in something that we are at least remotely interested in. However, for many students the standard majors of biology, math, English, economics or government do not fully encompass their interests, passions and goals. Other universities and colleges offer some majors that are more specified for certain interests. For example, at Dartmouth you can major in music, but at Liverpool Hope University you can major in The Beatles. At University of Connecticut you can major in puppet arts if you decide you don’t like being on the theater stage yourself. Har vard University offers a concentration in folklore and mythology, in case you didn’t get enough of that as a kid. If we had our way, here are some of the majors we’d make out of classes that already exist at Dartmouth.

Animal Loving There’s no doubt that the most popular kids on campus aren’t actually kids but pets. With the recent addition of new puppies at several fraternities, Facebook newsfeeds have been flooded with pictures of baby animals. So what if you wanted to turn your favorite pastime and cuddle buddy into your major? Start with “Lemurs, Monkeys and Apes” in the anthropology department and add the Earth sciences course “Dinosaurs” for a historical component.

Maybe round out the major with some psychology classes so you can learn how to classically condition an animal and some biology involving coursework in evolution.

How to be a Politician Dar tmouth already of fers a major in government and a minor in public policy. So if you want a future on the Hill, you’re probably doing at least one of these and maybe taking a few econ classes, too. However, as we have seen in recent years, being a good politician isn’t about having a background in how the government is supposed to work or how to formulate policies.

Majoring in how to be a politician would basically teach you how to be Frank Under wood. In fact, the culminating experience would prob-

ably involve watching and debating the plausibility of episodes of “House of Cards” and “Scandal.” But before you get there you would have to take Anthropology 16: “Secrecy and L ying in Politics”, Government 31: “Campaigns and Elections” and Speech 25: “Persuasive Public Speaking.”

Lifting Athletes at Dartmouth spend a lot of time at practice, and this extracurricular already fits prominently into their resumes. So what if they could major in being a varsity athlete?

Coursework would include practice, lift, conditioning and team bonding.

Majors would also have to complete several PE classes. In order to graduate with honors, your team would have to qualify for NCAA championships.

NARPs can major in lifting as well by taking PE classes and playing a club sport. They could also join varsity teams as managers for extra credit.

Comedy For those who don’t really know what they want to do with their lives but like to make people laugh, comedy is the major for you. The intro course for this major would be Classics 2: “The Tragedy and Comedy of Greece and Rome,” where students learn about the origin of comedy. Most students drop the major after taking this class and realizing that comedy in ancient Greece and Rome is not actually that funny and most of it is a “you had to be there” kind of humor. Plan for a concentration in Jewish comedy and take Jewish Studies 22.3: “From Fanny to the Nanny: Jewish Women and Humor” and Jewish Studies 24.2: “Rabbis, Rogues and Schlemiels: Jewish Humor and Its Roots.” This major provides plenty of career opportunities — including writing Conan O’Brien’s graduation speeches.

Rock(s) This interdisciplinar y major is perfect for those students who are torn between their love of science and their more creative talents. The major would be primarily made up of classes in the music and Earth science departments. A major in Rock(s) eschews classes like Music 5:”Histor y of Jazz” or EARS 3:”Elementar y Oceanography” and focuses only on

the two “Rs.” In order to graduate, all majors must create and produce a “Schoolhouse Rock” episode about — you guessed it — rocks.

Gaming If your favorite mode of procrastination is breaking out the Xbox, this major mixes work with pleasure. But don’t get too excited. This major consists of some pretty intense courses not for the light-hearted. Core courses include Film 38: “Advanced Animation,” Film 51: “Game Design Studio,” Computer Science 24: “Computer Animation” and Engineering 31: “Digital Electronics.” The computer science and ENGS courses require several pre-requisites, making this major equivalent to majoring in both computer science and engineering. Like I said, this may seem like the major for the couch potato who plays video games all day, but in reality it’s probably more fitting for the closet genius.

Pre-CIA Forget pre-med — for those budding Carrie Mathisons out there, this major will prepare you for a life undercover.

Pre-CIA requires a mixture of psychlogy, government, and geography with classes that will keep you on your toes. Maybe throw in a martial arts class or two as well. Popular classes include Government 54: “International Security,” Geography 23: “Power, Territoriality and Political Geography” and Psychology 44: “Psychology and Organizations.” Speaking a foreign language fluently is also a requirement for this major.

Never Wanted a Job Anyway This is what we all wish we could major in. There are absolutely no requirements for this major. You simply have to take 10 classes from 10 different departments: the more random and interesting, the better. Popular choices include drumming and Chinese 62: “Chinese Calligraphy.” Classes in the Thayer are frowned upon, as is ECON 1. If you aren’t excited for class ever y day, you are doing this major wrong.

This major is all about learning for the sake of learning, not to sell out to Wall Street or become a millionaire by taking your startup public. Lastly, in order to graduate magma cum laude, you must lack a job and plan to move back in with your parents after graduation.

EXECUTIVE EDITOR AMELIA ROSCH

Rowing camper: The hope of being able to eat FoCo every day is motivation to keep my grades up my junior year of high school.

SAUSSY member: I skipped SAUSSY to go to Argentine tango.

’16 Girl: I feel like LinkedIn is the new Friendsy.

’16 Guy: I’m gonna make the Masters chess tournament a drinking event. You shotgun a beer whenever you lose a piece.

’16 Girl: Would it be bad if I wore my Masters tank to Diversions?

’16 New Yorker: I really needed a cell phone in 7th grade so I could call my parents to pick me up after bar mitzvahs.

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A Day in the Life story

D @ RTMOUTH

B y Amanda winch

As the only Dartmouth term with a reputation for lighter course loads and “ample” free time, sophomore summer has proven distinctive, but perhaps not in the ways that one might have so eagerly expected while cruising down the road to 14X. Faced with an almost unhealthy number of opportunities for procrastination and inspired by a new sense of durability that undoubtedly only serves to help us justify our sluggish work habits, many in the ’16 class have finally reached the end of what might be referred to as an eight-week “adjustment period.” Leafing through pages of previously unopened textbooks and unearthing syllabi to prepare for midterms and finals, it’s easy to observe one’s peers and assume that everyone has put themselves in the same compromised position.

In reality, however, such might not be the case.

As the only Dartmouth term in which it is not uncommon for students to take two-class terms or even forego classes altogether, summer provides a various experiences for students depending at least in part upon their academic commitment level. It’s the first term where it’s normal to find yourself alone in Baker lobby while classmates crowd the swimming docks or anxiously await 5 o’clock to be released from work. As such, we’ve taken the liberty of asking what a day in the life of students taking zero, two or three classes looks like so that those of us living the “typical” sophomore summer experience might get a better sense of what “typical” really means.

Zero Classes: The 9-to-5 Grind Name: Kaitlin McCallum ’16 Typical day: 9 a.m. wake up, every day but Thursday, catch the Advanced Transit bus to Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center, work until

2 p.m. before making my way to track practice.

After practice ends around 5 p.m., I head home to my off-campus house for dinner and de-stressing.

Benefits of working in lieu of school? I enjoy a significant amount of free time, which allows me to focus on my interests extensively.

There is a definitive end to educative time, and each moment I get to spend as a part of the workforce, utilizing my knowledge, provides me which unanticipated strength. I spend a significant amount of my free time seeking social intimacy and authenticity, and the support I’ve experienced lately from my friends and [sorority] sisters has been truly remarkable. I also make enough money to allow me to participate in the social activities that I want to!

Downsides of working vs. studying: Having a job disables a lot of the socializing that occurs between classes, and I rarely attend events with friends when they are scheduled in the afternoon or early evening because I have other obligations.

Two Classes: A Slightly Lighter Load Name: Toni Aguiar ’16 Typical day: While Tuesdays and Thursdays are brutal because of 10A/2A scheduling, a restful Monday, Wednesday and Friday make doing work much more manageable and enjoyable.

Most afternoons are reserved for relaxation and logging river hours, and every weekend is four days long.

Benefits of the two-class term? I have so much free time. I’ve been way more involved socially with my sorority, and I’ve been trying to work through my summer bucket list. I’ve been down to the river and have been spending a lot of good time building my relationships.

Lib time: I usually have a few hours of reading

assigned per class on top of projects, papers and midterms. I also spend a significant amount of time in the studio, generally 7-10 hours a week.

Reflective opinion? Taking a reduced course load is way better. I’m doing well in both of my classes and have been able to solidify a lot of my relationships. If you are presented with the opportunity, I would totally recommend a Hanover FSP. They are really awesome for the summer, when you feel partially liberated from the homework grind.

Three Classes: Just a Normal Term?

Name: Robin Overing ’16 Typical day: Monday and Friday I get up at 7 a.m. and go to lift, eat, go to a 9L and an 11, eat, work all afternoon. On Mondays, ENVS lab, then go to dinner and do more work. One class on Tuesday and Thursday as well.

Differences from other terms? This term has pretty much felt like a typical term. I wanted to have a lighter load so I only took one engineering course, but I ended up taking Architecture 1, which requires a lot of time. Last week I spent three whole days in the woodshop building a piece of furniture, which was really cool.

Three courses is definitely the way to go unless you’re preparing to find a job or doing research.

But it is a great time to be on campus and enjoy the weather.

Study habits: Usually the start of the week’s a heavier load for me. I’ve had a problem set due on Tuesday for ENGS up until this week and lab also on Monday. I spend probably about 15-20 hours studying earlier in the week and less later in the week. Especially how it’s been working out with larger projects, the work comes in waves.

Leaving it all to weekdays is a bad idea.

Home Sweet...Hanover? story

B y MARY LIZA HARTONG

Feeling a shiver of terror creep up your spine?

Glimpsing tiny, shadowy figures? You’re not alone. Every few solstices a throng of menacing creatures appears, seemingly overnight, on campus, and we are powerless to stop them. We turn our heads and drop our FoCo to go boxes in fear as we watch these beings take flight, zero in on their targets and descend. Cicadas, you ask.

Wasps? Alums? No, friends, I’m talking about your parents.

A few weeks ago, mine flew in, along with my two sisters, my brother-in-law, and my sister’s boyfriend. They came with gaggles of goggles and hoards of hiking boots, having misheard the words “family weekend” as “family week.”

My mother has planned this extended shindig since the day I got into Dartmouth.

“Do you think it’s too late to rent a house for sophomore summer family week?” she asked as I read my acceptance letter. “I bet people reserve houses way in advance!”

I didn’t have the heart to tell her most people wouldn’t start thinking about it for another two years, so instead I advised that she “move it or lose it.”

When the whole crew first arrived I was thrilled, if a little flustered. I wanted to spend every moment with them, but I also wanted to do homework, see my friends and binge watch “The Mindy Project,” as per my normal routine.

My sister insisted we work out at 6 a.m. every morning to ensure maximum bonding time, and my parents treated us to off-campus meals that lasted late into the evening. By Wednesday I was exhausted.

The balance between excitement and exhaustion during family visits is one to which many sophomores can relate. Andrea Price ’16 hosted her Seattle-based clan over family weekend, including her sister who had never visited the College because she lives abroad. Price said that she and her family, who enjoy the Northeast, spent most of the weekend hiking and having dinner at the Lodge.

“I’m going home for interim, so I’ll see them all again in a few weeks,” Price said. “The worst part is when they leave you have to go back to eating DDS.” Olivia Morrison ’16 share’s Price’s “see you soon” mentality when it comes to missing family.

“Our breaks are long enough that we’re only away from home for two-and-a-half months, so we’re not apart that long,” Morrison said.

Morrison, who lives just three-and-a-halfhours from campus in Connecticut, enjoyed getting to spend time with her family over the weekend, especially her pet yellow lab.

Morrison noted that she saw many more dogs on campus during the weekend, which she thought could be because of the number hotels near campus that have begun to allow pets. But, when it came time for her four and two-legged kin to leave, Morrison got right back to work — with a quiz the next day, she began studying once they left.

Kyle Kittelberger ’16, a North Carolina native, believes having space from one’s parents is essential to the college experience.

“I think it’s nice to not be that close by to my parents,” said Kittelberger, who has many

friends who go to college much closer to their childhood homes. “Here you can mature on your own and not have your parents guide your way. [They’ve] been with you your whole life, and it’s nice to see them every once in a while, maybe once a term, but you need that term to do your own thing.”

Kittelberger’s sister will be joining him this fall as a member of the Class of 2018.

“I think it will be a great place for her, a place where she can find more independence and also figure out who she wants to be,” Kittelberger said. “I think she likes the fact that she’s going to be here while I’m here more than I do.”

The night before my family left they asked if I wanted to spend the night with them at the lake house 25 minutes away. I told them I would rather go out with my friends, so they dropped me back off at my dorm. I looked around at my room, taking in the stark white walls festooned with posters, the shower shoes by the bathroom and the meager stash of snacks, and then I did what any mature adult would do: I called my mom and told her to turn the car around.

In some ways we are grown up here. We feed, clean and clothe ourselves, get to places on time, have jobs and commitments, do our own laundry and choose whom to associate with. However, we have the luxury of not being out of the nest just yet. Our parents will still buy us a few dinners, listen when we phone them crying about the mean T.A. who called us, and I quote, “way below the median.” They’ll be waiting for us at home. And who knows, they may just swarm into Hanover again sometime soon.

The Fifty

Through Hikers

You’ll smell them first, but regardless, they’re tough as nails.

fieldstock Green Key 2.0 or just a normal weekend?

10-Year-OLDS High schoolers we can deal with, but since when did FoCo become and elementary school cafeteria?

tanks If you haven’t received at least one this summer, you’re doing something wrong.

Missing the hop It’s been too long since we’ve had a Christmas bacon wrap.

LINGERIe

4// MIRROR

bUcket list busting story

B y Hayley Adnopoz

Since we’ve somehow crossed into August, ’16s have been furiously working through never-ending bucket lists, hoping to cram their days full of copper mine cliff jumps, berr y picking and, of course, the summer staple that is the Ledyard Challenge.

We blitzed 1,083 ’16s, asking if they’ve checked these activities and more off their lists, and 150 students responded (we hope our statistics professors would say that’s a big enough sample size!). For each of the 13 activities in the sur vey, those who had already completed it were in the minority. So if you’re still frantically looking for someone to strip to their birthday suit and jump into the river with you, don’t worr y, you’re not alone. Nearly three

quarters of those sur veyed say they haven’t done the Ledyard Challenge yet, so your odds of finding other enthusiasts are looking pretty good.

Keep working through those bucket lists (if you’re into them, that is), and keep staying away from the blue light challenge. That one is just asking for trouble. If you still don’t know what it is, don’t ask.

been berry picking?

ALLISON GUH//THE DARTMOUTH STAFF