Post #59: Disoriented and Burned Out

So I went orientation earlier in the week, and now I'm like 'I don't want to go to school.' I honestly really like school. I love learning and taking notes. But after five campus tours, two hours of sleep in the freezing dorm, and frustrating seminars that made no sense, I was ready to lay under a table and cry. And I'm not a public crier. But during the registration seminar after a night of two hours of sleep and one mug of horrible coffee, I seriously considered hiding under a table and crying. I didn't, but it was definitely an option. Eventually everything got straightened out, I ended up dropping Spanish, and I still have 8am classes, but it sort of worked out. At the registration seminar they kept saying you can only take 15 credits. You can't have more.  Prior to dropping Spanish, I had 18. "Well, you'll have to drop something. You can't have more than 15 credits." the ever-so-pleasant liberal arts college representative practically yelled. "Well, why can't I take more? Is it a financial aid thing?" I asked. "No, it's just that you can't handle more than 15 credits. No one can handle more than 15. That's a full load." Uh-huh. Sure. Whatever lady. I did end up with 15, but I'm looking for another elective class. They kept telling us "You're going to have 3 hours of homework per class every night." and "You can't just show up and expect to do well." and "This is nothing like high school."
You're right. I get to take what classes I want and I don't have to fight the School District. And I'm paying an awful lot of money to be here (or at least the federal government is. Thanks, FAFSA!). But other than that, it seems a lot like high school.
At AACT (go trailblazers!), we got almost the exact same spiel every year. Lots of homework, you can't just show up, this isn't a regular high school. But honestly, with the exception of APUSH, I never came home with more than 30-45 minutes of homework per class, and for most of my classes, I could just show up. I had to participate, but I pretty much just had to be present. So as people keep telling me it's so hard and so time consuming, I can't help but feel a little skeptical.
And to top it off, I had to go to the MANDATORY (it was all in caps on the schedule) "How To Be Part of The Pack". It left me feeling embarrassed and like I'd much rather join the Honey Badgers (but aren't those generally solitary creatures who don't give a shit, you ask? Exactly, I reply). What they called team spirit seemed belligerent and a little mean spirited, and never once did anyone say "we might be rivals in sports, but we are all from the same state, and we're all human beings, so be respectful to the UNLV guys." We got yelled at about how the University of Nevada, Reno is actually The University of Nevada and they don't ever want to hear us say UNR. 'But don't you want to make sure people don't confuse you with your evil arch nemesis UNLV' I thought to myself. Apparently not. UNR was first and UNLV is terrible and blah blah blah. We are from the Same. Flipping. State. And we might be a tier one school, but I don't think we are anywhere near the best school in the west. We are not the pride of the west. And I will wear whatever I want on campus. Maybe not a UNLV shirt, I don't want to get beat up, but I'm going to wear my red converse and my red sweaters and shirts. They tried to tell us we can't wear red on campus, and I think that that's ridiculous. One of the things I am most looking forward to is the lack of silly dress code rules. If I want to wear a hat on campus, I will. UNR can't stop me from wearing my bright red Yukon Jack hat. I"M GONNA STICK IT TO THE MAN! (but respectfully. If someone requests I take it off, and by someone I mean professor, I will).
"If most of us valued food and cheer and song over hoarded gold, it would be a merrier world." - J.R.R. Tolkien
-D.