Work's not among buzzwords on Yale campus

By Alex Liebman

I'm really thrilled to be back at Yale. I've anxiously awaited the hours of "blue-booking" and searching for classes that greet me upon my return. What astonishes me, though, it just how little course work seems to matter to everyone else - the administration, the students, and the professors.

First, it seems that the Yale administration has been more involved in cruel attempts to starve us and in misguided efforts to help out the New Haven economy. Though dorms opened on Wednesday the 25th, the dining halls did not provide their culinary delights until Tuesday the 1st. Here we have yet another area in which Yale is trying to nickel-and-dime us to make more money. (Or, perhaps, a noble and charitable initiative to help out the New Haven economy by injecting students' money into the local economy?) After all, Yale really cares about New Haven and its residents. That's why they threw out Broadway Pizza, Store 24, and last year, the Daily Caffe (the few establishments around Yale actually frequented by native New Haveners), and put in Urban Outfitters and Starbucks Coffee, two stores all New Haven residents have been clamoring for for decades. As if, in addition to the three Willougby's, Atticus, Au Bon Pain, Xando, Book Trader Café, and Koffee?, what we really needed was another overpriced gimmick coffee shop.

While the administration has been worried about providing for students' frenzied consumerism, the students themselves seem more interested in shouting at each other in the tremendous heat of the "Freshman Bazaar." However, there is a positive trend emerging: two years ago the event was held on Old Campus, last year it was on Cross Campus, and this year it moved to Beinecke plaza — within a few years the bazaar should be beyond Science Hill and no one but a few pre-meds will have to endure it any more. With all the shouting and confusion, it's a miracle any freshmen sign up for anything. Some are convinced that signing up entails absolutely no commitment — of course, by signing your name you've just assured yourself about 50 emails a day from the group's list, mostly from kids pleading with the list administrator to take them off. Maybe they're just hoping for a way to procrastinate in Sterling once classes begin.

Presumably, though, the professors are still most interested in their teaching responsibilities. So given all the nonsense one endures during the orientation, I thought I'd try to escape by finding the graded final exams I took last term, full of incisive, helpful comments from interested professors - but this proved more difficult than expected. Some of my friends have wryly commented that professors are just trying to give us concrete, real world, problem solving abilities—notably patience and interpersonal skills—needed to succeed in today's world. Personally, I find it shocking how little care is given to returning student work.

The other day, I walked to the Economics department, where no one was quite sure where the finals from Econ 116b were. After several phone calls, I wastold that the exams were likely in "the dungeon" (I knew studying econ always felt a little like S&M). Fortunately, it turned out that each student's exams were separated in six mislabeled boxes in an unmarked cabinet on the first floor. But the next stop on my scavenger hunt—the Political Science departmentwas even more difficult. After looking through six floors and two buildings with hundreds of finals strewn on window sills, in hallways, and practically in a bathroom, (and talking with a rather rude administrative assistant who seemed shocked that a student should actually be looking for his graded tests), I was unable to locate my exam from a course I took last term. The History department was even worse, consisting only of heaps of bunched blue books all over the professors' and TAs' boxes. (Needless to say, after twenty minutes of searching, I was unable to find my final). I was able to discover, though, hundreds of finals that had been left since fall '98. Either Yale students don't collect their exams because they aren't interested in the feedback of their professors, or maybe they just figure they won't be able to find their finals at all.

And then it struck me! Maybe students should spend less time doing "fascinating" (the latest buzz-word) extracurriculars and more time focusing on their classes. And maybe the administration should spend less time figuring out how long we can go without food or where to put the latest yuppie store and more time rewarding professors who take grading and returning students' work seriously. Right. Alex Leibman is a Junior in Calhoun.

Back to Opinion...