Sunday, March 16, 2008

Last Chance

Thursday was our last class of winter quarter, and by Tuesday I'll have all my assignments complete and turned in (god willing). Spring quarter will be nice because it should be a little lighter on the Stanford coursework end of things. We only have two required classes (as opposed to four), leaving the option of taking an elective. There are no restrictions on what I can take, which is pretty amazing. An entire university system, mine for the taking.

But that in itself is feeling more like a curse than a blessing. Luckily (in that it makes my decision much easier), I can't take anything before 2pm or that on Wednesdays or Thursdays. I thought about a math class, but then I remembered just how ridiculously time-consuming and difficult college math classes are. I thought about Spanish for Teachers because, hey, I'm a teacher who needs to know Spanish. But I'd rather just go to South America this summer. There are lots of interesting ed school classes, but I'm a little sick of ed classes right now. I thought about yoga or wine tasting to force me into getting away from teaching at least once a week, but is that really the best use of my thousands of tuition dollars? It hit me that this is most likely my last opportunity EVER to take a college class, especially one at Stanford. Should I go for econ, something I always wanted to do but never got around to in undergrad? Wouldn't it be awesome to take a class at Stanford Law or Stanford Business? What is the ONE thing I want?

Honestly, choosing an elective is a little more than I can handle right now. This morning I spent about 10 minutes just trying to decide what I wanted to order for breakfast, so I'm not really in a state to sort through the entire course catalog. However if you happen to have nothing better to do, I'm taking suggestions until the registration deadline on Friday.
http://www.stanford.edu/dept/registrar/bulletin/bulletin06-07/

6 comments:

Jaya said...

If I were you:

ARTHIST 234A The Harlem Renaissance
ARTSTUDI 149 Collage
ARTSTUDI167 Introduction to Animation
COMPLIT 125 Underground Literatures and Unofficial Cultures
COMPLIT 241 Comparative Fictions of Ethnicity
CASA 74 South Asian Histories and Cultures through Popular Film: Bollywood and Beyond
FEMST 253 Women and the Creative Imagination
GERGEN 104Q Resistance Writings in Nazi Germany
HISTORY 52S The Ku Klux Klan and the Anti-Coolie League: Racist Movements in 19th-Century America

I'm so jealous. You've got so many great choices. I've got to go back to school soon.

Jen said...

The complit choices that Jaya suggested actually sound like they'd have application for you AND be fun! So might Casa 74.

Good luck deciding - it can't be easy.

Geetha said...

You gotta stick to the criteria... none of those classes are offered this quarter.

Anonymous said...

Yikes, there are so many great options. Here are just a few of the ones that appeal to me and I though might appeal to you.
Japanese Literature in Translation
The Chinese Family
CLASSGEN 22N--Technologies of Civilization : Writing, Numbers, and Money
COMM 207--The First Amendment in the Digital Age
COMM240--New Media Entrepreneurship
COMM246--Language and Discourse--RAce, Class, Gender
COMM 262--Analysis of Presidential Campaigns
COMM 266--Virtual People
COMM 277K--Human Rights Journalism
COMPLIT 155--Of Beasts and Beauties: Tales of Transformation from Antiquity to Present
CICANST 180E--Intro to Chcana/o Studies
CHICANST 181s--U.S.- Mexico Borderlands
CSRE 203 A The Changing Face of Marica--Civil Rights and Education STrategies in teh 21st Century
ECON 146--Economics of Education
FEMST 140M--South Asian Women in the Diaspora

They are all Spring term, but I did not check times. There are a zillion (not a real number, I know) more choices that looked interesting. I agree with Jaya, there is too much fun stuff in college. I am also jealous of this opportunity.

Credit said...

Ok, there are lot of different ways you could go with this. You could try a specialized course on something you have a basic knowledge of, or you could try something introductory in a field you never got a chance to do in Asquared (like Econ). Of course in that option you probably end up in a course with mostly freshman. You could also take an art class, like a photography.
These course looked interesting to me, not sure if you'd find them interesting:
(in no particular order)
PHIL 50 Into to Logic -- WFF 'N Proof anyone?
ENG 186 American Hauntings -- Do you like ghost stories?
ENG 173 American Comedy and Satire - Or do you prefer comedy?
ENG 153 Technology, Ecology and Imaginations of the Future -- As close to Sci Fi as I could find
ENG 152G - Harlem Renaissance -- I took this course here and absolutely loved it.
ENG 42B The Films of Woody Allen --Could be a lite, yet entertaining course
ECON 116 American Economic History
COMM 148 Hip Hop and Don't Stop-Intorduction to Modern Speech Communities
HIST 249 History without Documents -- apparently most of the history department takes the spring off, because this was the only one of the good history courses offered
I also noted that the Introduction to Universal Grammer class wasn't offered this semester. Figured that might something you'd enjoy.

Wow, that was kinda fun. I haven't felt that smart in years.
Eric

Anonymous said...

I am thinking maybe we are not making this any easier. Eric found lots of interesting things that I missed. Have fun picking and do let us know what you select.
Mom