Staff Commentary: Forgetting that one little thing

I have this planner. It’s covered in stickers that I have gotten randomly from various activities, stores, career fairs, etc. Anyway, the outside is incredibly busy, but when you open it’s even crazier. During my first class every week, I try and write down my entire schedule. Everything goes in: track practice, Labre meetings, Carroll News stuff, lunch dates, SUPB events, choir practices. But I always feel like I’m missing something. Usually by the time Wednesday rolls around, I finally figure out what is missing from my schedule. It seems as though I consistently fail to write in any of my assignments that are due that week, and I also forget to plan time to do them.

I’m starting to realize that this is a common phenomenon throughout the hallowed halls of John Carroll University. It’s always entertaining to me when I overhear someone talking to a friend about the test they thought was next week or the paper they completely forgot they had. That is until it reminds me that I have a response paper due tomorrow too…on a book I haven’t read yet.
This happened to me just last week.

I was trying to get ahead in my Intro to Novel class when I looked at my syllabus and realized that I wasn’t getting ahead at all. I was barely keeping up. Needless to say, my response paper on “Innocent Erendria” didn’t turn out quite as planned.

The problem, I’ve decided, is that school work seems to be interfering with college. I can just hear my parents gasping, “How dare you say that! College is all about your education.” I whole heartedly believe this. We aren’t paying this much so that we can sit around and get bad grades. But we aren’t paying so I can sit around and study all day either. College is about education of all sorts, opening your mind and your eyes to whatever you can. It’s about discovering how to teach ourselves what is useful knowledge. It’s about taking advantage of opportunities that come our way.

I am taking advantage of my experience. If it means staying up for six more hours in order to get the book read and the paper done, so be it. I haven’t regretted any of my time spent at John Carroll so far, and I plan to continue on this way. I hope that those who will be leaving us in a few weeks can say the same thing.

So for everyone out there in the Carroll News world, faculty included, you’ve heard it before, but let me reiterate – get out there. Experience it while you still can, even if the experience is just taking a walk around the Boler School between classes to see if you get lost.