I Love the Honors Humanities FIG!

When I first heard about the Freshman Interest Group program (a.k.a FIG) during summer orientation I thought it sounded like a horrible plan for my college career. This stemmed from the fact that I thought joining a FIG meant I would have to take the same core classes with the same students all four years. Although I now realize the stupidity of this, at the time I had determined not to join a FIG. However, once someone explained to me that the FIG only lasted for the first semester and I would receive an extra honors credit I decided to join. And as sappy as it sounds, that was the best decision I made for my freshman year at college.

I was overwhelmed the first day of class when we went around the room telling something interesting about ourselves. Listening to everyone’s backgrounds I started feeling like my life in Sidney, Montana had been pretty boring. That night I called my parents and told them about the people in my FIG; one girl had spent the summer canoeing in the Arctic, one boy went to boarding school in New Hampshire, and another reminded me of the professor in Legally Blonde. I wasn’t sure if I would have anything in common with anyone or if I could make any friends in this group. Thankfully as I finally began learning people’s names, I realized that these were great people and was grateful that I had joined our FIG.

Being in our FIG has been great, both academically and socially. Working with such amazing writers has prompted me to try and improve my writing. After we read our renditions of the “I Have a Dream” speeches I read my pathetic paragraph and realized I needed to work hard to make my writing better. I also love having my ideas challenged by people with such a variety of opinions. I had never met anyone who hadn’t read any of the Bible or someone who hated Wal-Mart. I enjoy listening to people’s arguments in ENEX and reading everyone’s blogs. I had never been concerned with legalizing marijuana, but because Jamie has such passion for this I found myself wanting to learn more about it.

More importantly than what being in this FIG has provided me intellectually, is what it has given me socially. Being in a FIG was like the college handing me a package of friends; after spending so much time in class together it was inevitable that we would start being friends outside of class. I am fairly shy and know that if I hadn’t of joined the FIG I would have spent all my time with Natalie. While I love Natalie and still spend a lot of time with her, I needed to make some new friends. I only had a few close friends in high school so I loved having friends here who liked me, even with all my oddities. (Any of you have spent time with me know that I am crazy. Stalking, throwing pumpkins, Food Zoo paranoia, and that’s just the beginning.) Being in this FIG has also pulled me out from under my rock, especially concerning music. Thanks to the help of my fellow FIGers I will soon be able to recognize every Dave Matthews Band song ever recorded. Being in the Honors Humanities FIG (which is obviously the best) has been the greatest part of my experience at the University of Montana.

Noel's Rant

Noel’s rant against spoiled children and their parents was a great example of a rant. Our rants were supposed to be dispassionate, humorous, and sarcastic, and Noel’s rant combines all three nicely. She writes her entire rant without overusing her anger or emotion. Then, when her anger does come out against Mark Juras, it is funny and adds to the rant as a whole. She also effectively uses sarcasm, especially in the statement, “Who has ever looked at a pleasant, quiet, obedient little girl and thought, ‘Wow, her parents must not love her at all.’ ”

Noel could make this rant more effective by deciding who exactly the rant is against, parents or children. If it is parents, then it would help to talk about Mark Juras’s parents and how their horrible job of raising him caused him to be such a brat. The rant could also be strengthened by describing why parents today aren’t good at disciplining their children. My parents sure didn’t have problems, so it would be nice to know why parents today are different. Noel starts the rant by saying she is embarrassed that our society produces naughty children, but never says how society produces these kids.

Overall, Noel’s rant is a dispassionate rant that combines humor and sarcasm to make it entertaining. Good Job Noel!

P.S. I see now that a lot of other people commented on Noel’s blog, but I already started this when I saw that so Noel will just get a lot of advice.

Too Smart for That

Last year during Calculus class, my math buddy Caycee asked me what my best friend Andrew was going to major in at college. I answered elementary education with a smile because I knew Andrew would make a great teacher. However, Caycee frowned and said, “Isn’t he too smart for that?”

I was shocked by this statement because I had never realized that people could be too smart to become teachers. I had always assumed that people wanted smart teachers. People constantly complain about bad teachers, so I thought people would be thrilled to know that someone smart enough to work at NASA is loving enough to give up a great salary to work in a cramped kindergarten classroom. It’s no wonder that public education has been suffering because only idiots ever become teachers. I guess this makes sense as all the intelligent people are working in laboratories or running for office. I do wonder, however, how these people managed to get so smart.

Once I understood that only stupid people should become teachers, I realized why so many people believe teaching is an easy career. It has to be easy if only dumb people should be doing it. Truthfully, teaching does appear to be an easy job. They supervise students reading from textbooks and occasionally answer questions. They also leave work when the students do, have the weekends off, and don’t work during the summer. Elementary education teachers have it the best because all they do is sing the alphabet, play outside during recess, and do basic math problems. It must be great to be a teacher because they don’t have to deal with any hard problems like child abuse, mental disabilities, or overbearing parents. It’s because teaching is so easy that I plan to do it, and that is probably one of the smartest decisions I’ve made.

P.S. Alison, this is the edited version. I read it over again and just laughed because it was so mean. All that hidden agression :)