The First Week

Monday (the 12^th) was our first actual day of school. Section 36 had classes with Professor Goettle (Economics) and Professor Clark (Marketing). This semester we’ll be competing against each other in Economics using the Business Strategy Game. Each team will represent separate companies in the shoe industry! I don’t know about you, but I love shoes (and almost anything related to fashion). Fingers tightly crossed that this factor will make me more interested in the game for the whole semester, beyond the letter grade at the end.

The first Marketing class involved going over a lot of administrative things, including taking a survey about Orientation. Once we got into the actual “lecture” portion of the class, it was a lot more interesting! Professor Clark is a very dynamic teacher; he even ran into a wall in order to demonstrate a point. I like this class a lot already, even if it is mostly due to the fact that, y’know, my professor purposely runs into walls. 

A group of folks from both sections went to get our coursepacks for Accounting and then headed over to the library to get started on all of our work. We spent about four hours working through the Accounting and then other assignments. Classes ended at 12:30, but I didn’t get home until after 6.

Section 36 has the luxury of sleeping in on Tuesdays! This is exciting, considering my wake-up time on most days this past week and a half has been around 5AM. It also gives us extra time to review for Accounting classes on Tuesday... if we're productive. I had my first class this morning, and I already know I’m in trouble. I didn’t do poorly on the initial assessment, but now comes the part where I have to learn how to use that information! I’ve reached out to Maude so I can get connected with an Accounting tutor as quickly as possible.

Tuesday features another multi-hour session at the library attempting to get through the second part of the Accounting homework. After two hours, I can’t get my balance sheet to balance properly, and I decide to work on other assignments in order to clear my head.  Later on in the evening, a classmate from the other section helps me work through the problem and get a grasp on the concepts involved. Ah, the powers of online chatting. 

Wednesday and Thursday are more of the same – class, case studies, and work. All I can think of is that I’m so ready for the weekend to be here!

On Friday, we have our first formal meeting with the Career Management team. Our class featured a guest speaker – Suzanne Goldstein. She gave us a very interesting presentation about figuring out our passions and interests (these are different, by the way). Suzanne has actually written a book about the whole subject – feel free to check it out if you’re interested. 

All the pretty ladies! :)

Friday night, a good part of the class goes out to Fanueil Hall to celebrate a classmate’s birthday (Happy Birthday, Tanushree!).  It is nice to unwind and dance the week’s stress away. It's also kind of funny to see everyone outside of a classroom setting. There’s only so much you really talk about when you are at school, but once you get everyone away from the textbooks and papers, their true personalities shine.

Saturday and Sunday, I work a few hours at Victoria’s Secret each day, and also work on some class assignments. The oh-so-glamorous life of a graduate student… I know. It may not sound so appealing at times, but the work needs to get done! 

And so we concluded our first week. It’s going to be an interesting semester, for sure.