Behind the Scenes with '13

This is my last post in “Behind The Scenes with ‘13”!!!!!!  I have my own (appropriately named) blog now, “The Not So Confidential Confessions of Cate”.  Check it out here!

Every high school student dreams of the day they don’t have to think about apply to colleges anymore, the day that SATs and essays don’t cross their mind, where anticipation and anxiety dissipate to relief.

I’m 3 years beyond the process of the college application experience, so maybe you think I don’t recall much of the experience.  This summer I think I have spent more time reliving the college application experience than maybe I spent actually applying to colleges.

It all started this summer when I started the admissions representative program.  Basically, after some training I now give interviews to applicants.  It’s probably my favorite three hours of my week.  In part because most of the rest of my week is dull.  I’ve always been told I am a good talker, so I occasionally like putting my talking skills to work.  Since joining admissions at the beginning of my freshmen year as a part of SAAB, my favorite part of the job is interacting with high school students, both prospective and admitted.  Admission representatives in unique in that these students are forced to talk to me for a good 45 minutes one on one.

When one is very bored, they often find hobbies. I have picked up coloring, which is a very, very pre-college pastime. Check out them coloring skills!

Some interviewees are really nervous.  Some hand you stacks of papers of resumes and grades and SAT scores.  I do not want to see those!!! For any future Hopkins interviewees, or interviewees for any other school, it is most refreshing when you are relaxed and you just act like yourself.  I like hearing about people’s lives, so I always find it interesting to have some stranger go on about themselves for an hour or so.

Most of the time the interview is spent talking about the boring stuff, i.e. APs and academics.  Occasionally, I get really unique glimpses of who exactly these kids are, like the girl I discussed where exactly in the Doctor Who series I should begin.  Then we swooned over how gorgeous (and British) Matt Smith is.  It’s the moments like these that I enjoy the best.  It’s learn the quirks about each applicant, the movies they love, the books they read, the music they listen to, and occasionally odd things like attractive British celebrities.  Interviews are done for the summer now, but I will commence again once the school year begins.

The rest of my summer has been spent tutoring.  In June I joined a group called MESA, where I have been tutoring students from across the state of Maryland, most from Baltimore County.  MESA is a bit different than some of the other tutoring opportunities at Hopkins.  A student has to be accepted into the program, so each student involved is very motivated as well as meets a certain academic requirement.  All of the students are minorities, which is something that makes me very happy.  As a high school student, I wrote a research paper in my AP Language and Composition on affirmative action, ultimately arguing in favor.  I think it takes some people by surprise that I, being of middle class and also white, am in favor of affirmative action.  Also, I find the grand majority of people I meet are against it.

Anyways, this blog is not going to go into a discussion of affirmative action.  When I joined this group at the beginning of summer my initial task was to individually help students with SAT math questions.  Eventually it turned into my lecturing on math topics such as geometry and probability (this required a refresher on my behalf, ick applied math.)  Then the students wanted workshops on writing, so I began to teach on writing an essay for the SAT, and then it turned into discussions on personal essay writing and searching for scholarships and universities online.  Originally, it was simply teaching simple math concepts, but suddenly I feel like I have become a personal coach on college admissions, which I may or may not be qualified for.

I haven't been doing any studying at all. Voila!, my desk. Observe the empty peanut m&m bag, the hamburger phone (yay Juno!!), and the unopened bottle of sparkling grape juice given at the first ever chembe excellence ceremony.

To me it’s been a really amazing experience.  In the end only five students stuck with the program.  Honestly, it was hard to see the rest go.  One week each of the five students did a presentation on a university on their choice.  It was then that I learned that one boy wanted to be a doctor, another wants to be a statistician, another wants to go into sports management, and the last wants to pursue both art and engineering and is particularly interested in the joint program between Hopkins and Mica.  The only girl wants to join the air force and become an engineer, which to me is an incredible dream.

Only two more weeks remain in the program, and then the students move onto a different program, which will continue to prepare them for college and standardized testing.  I guess it’s been a particularly special experience in that these kids are really interested in gaining something from this experience, and, shockingly many of them are only high school sophomores and juniors.  I have really built an awesome relationship with each of them.  It’s nice to have someone ask me questions for a change.  Instead of me asking interviewees “Why Hopkins?”, I get to be asked “How did you end up at Hopkins?”, “What about scholarships and financial aid?”, etc.

There are a few words that ring bells in my ears during interviews, one being diversity.  I think this word is thrown around a lot in college admissions, and it has many different meanings.  One question on the list of potential interview question is something along the lines of “What could you gain from the Hopkins experience, and what, in turn, do you have to contribute?”  I hate asking this question because it’s like hitting an interviewee with the hypothetical baseball bat of abstractness and vagueness.  However, now I can say diversity is something I have gained from Hopkins, diversity of world view, diversity of opinion, diversity of culture, diversity of interests, diversity of aspirations, diversity of background and experience.  Coming into the Hopkins community, I thought I couldn’t contribute much in terms of diversity.   In high school, you take part in extracurriculars in part for something to do with your time, but also to build a strong resume for colleges.  Once you’re in college, what you do in your free time doesn’t have a huge impact on what you will be able go and do in the future.  Hopkins has lead me to do so many great things with my life so far, not only academically, but also non academically.  I do these on my own accord for maybe no real reason at all.  This summer has really shown me what I can contribute to the Hopkins community as well as the entire community as a whole.

Hey everyone!  After a great sophomore year, this is the last entry I’ll be posting to the Behind the Scenes with ’13 blog.  Be sure to follow my new blog, Long Story Short, for junior year updates.

FIVE DAYS TIL MADRID.  Ahhhhh SPAINSPAINSPAINSPAINSPAIN!!!!!!

It’s just starting to sink in that I’ll be abroad in Madrid for the next four months.  Craziness.  I’ve known since high school that I wanted to study abroad in Spain, but now it’s actually happening and I’m still completely in denial that I’ll be boarding a plane in five days.  It’s actually kind of a problem: I still feel like I have all the time in the world to do all of the necessary Spain prep (i.e. packing absolutely everything, reading the assigned reading book, finding electrical converters/adapters, etc), but in reality I only have until Friday.  Seriously, at the rate I’m getting things done these days in my post-orgo stupor, I don’t know how this is all going to happen.  It’s going to be a crazy week to say the least.

Since this is the last blog I’m writing from America, I decided to make a bucket list for Spain this fall.  I’ll be sure to give updates when these things actually get accomplished, and I’ll probably be adding plenty of new things throughout the semester.

Sarah’s Madrid Bucket List:

- LEARN SPANISH

- Try tons of new Spanish foods and maybe learn to cook something

- See Calle Gran Via in person – it’s been my computer desktop background since 10th grade

- Go for at least ten days without setting foot in a Starbucks (It actually pained me to type that out just now.  I’ll miss you, venti iced americanos.)

- Help host sisters with their English homework

- Learn to appreciate soccer more.  And try to follow Real Madrid.

- Go to Mercado de San Miguel.  I’m imagining it to be completely amazing.  SO MUCH FOOD.

- Go see rural Spain, not just the city

- Participate in family dinner discussions!  Be confident in your Spanish.

- See the Royal Palace in Madrid

- Take many siestas

- Walk through Retiro Park

- Find a place that broadcasts American baseball so you can watch the Phillies rock the MLB playoffs.  Crucial.

- See the Alhambra in Cordoba

- See the giant castle in Segovia

- See the Escorial (the place that Professor Sieber mentioned literally every single lecture in his Spanish Theater course)

- Visit Caroline (my friend from high school) in Austria & go on the Sound of Music tour in Salzburg!!  (I’ve seriously dreamt of doing this since I was like three.  Strange obsession, I know.)

- Take the train to Munich with Caroline to go to Oktoberfest!

- Learn some German before you go to these places with Caroline so that you’re less of an ignorant tourist in Germany and Austria

- Go to Barcelona!

- See La Sagrada Familia, Gaudi’s Cathedral

- Be able to give my family a decent tour of Madrid if they come for Thanksgiving

- Go on a spontaneous day/ weekend trip

- Become a pro at the Madrid metro system.

- Try flan, even though I’m not totally sure what it is (cake-ish?)

- See a live flamenco performance

- Go for at least a week without playing Words with Friends/ adjust to life without 24/7 internet access via iPhone

- Go for an entire day without speaking English (not too sure about this one either)

- Sit in the Plaza Mayor with coffee on a weekend morning

- Skype with one of your Hopkins friends from Universidad Carlos III

- Find new music.  Figure out what’s popular there.

- Make friends with my compañero (aka the student at Universidad Carlos who’s supposed to help me adjust to life at the university)

- Gain some perspective.  Take something away from this experience other than learning a language and seeing a new place.

So before I end my last blog entry from this side of the Atlantic, here are a few final summer photo updates:

This is pretty much Dr. Klein summarized in a picture.

Me and my sister, Elizabeth, coping with the 105 degree weather at a Phillies game.

Citizens Bank Park

Studying on the Upper Quad

Cannot believe I’ll be writing my next entry from 3000 miles away.  See you in December, America.

I guess tomorrow marks the last day of my sophomore experience.  At noon tomorrow I turn in my key to my Homewood Apartment, my sophomore residence.  Even though I haven’t lived there for nearly two months, today I stopped back today to clean (since I am that kind of person.)

All last semester I really felt like the only person who felt it was necessary to clean, even the kitchen.  Needless to say, all future roommates are subject to thorough investigation before we sign a lease together.  So there I arrived to apartment 408, the luxurious quad located conveniently right above Maxie’s Bar and Grill (a cause of many of my sleepless nights.)  In hand were a newly packaged sponge and a bottle of 409 cleaning solution.

Going back felt weird even thought I definitely need to return tomorrow because some of my roommates left a ton of trash and stuff in the apartment (a housing no-no!)  Oddly enough, I had forgotten the way that apartment smelled.  It has a distinct scent, not really a bad one (whew!)  I opened the door to my old bedroom.  There sat the plastic covered bed, the distinctly “dorm style” oak bedroom furniture.  I plopped onto my bed, which honestly sits about 2 feet lower to the ground than my new bed.

I have so many memories in that room.  Stressful sleepless nights before exams.  Early mornings spent studying before exams.  Exhausting late Friday nights where I crashed after a night of fun and adventure.  I bet I spent nearly a hundred hours watching 30 Rock on that bed.  I also ate many meals in that bed (I’m a bed eat-er, I admit.)

I confess I felt a little nostalgia after only two months.  I had forgotten so many of the details that defined the last nearly 12 months of my life.  I guess as my last bit of advice, whether it be for rising freshmen or high school students, is relish every moment, every detail.  Remember those distinct scents of your favorite place, the distance you fall until you plop onto your bed.  The reasons a place made you smile.  The reasons a place made you cry.  Life really does seem to pass you by.  At one moment you’re at one place, the next you’re not.  And who knows, maybe you’ll turn in a key, and you’ll never be open that door to that apartment again.

Not much has changed since my last blog: I’m still here at Hopkins taking organic chem. II, and I’m leaving for Spain in LESS THAN ONE MONTH!!!!!!

My roommate showing off his diving skills last weekend

To celebrate the halfway point in our summer of orgo, my roommate and I took a roadtrip back to Philly last weekend to relax at my house for a few days.  Since he had never been to Philly, we went to see some of the cliché historic sites like Independence Hall, Benjamin Franklin’s House, the Liberty Bell (well kind of… we saw it through a window), the former US Supreme Court Building, and a couple of Museums.  And of course we had to end the trip with Reading Terminal Market.    Seriously if you’re ever in Philadelphia and can only go to one place, it needs to be Reading Terminal Market.

Reading Terminal!!! So happy to be home

old US Supreme Courthouse

This is why you don't go to the Liberty Bell around the fourth of July. Lesson learned.

Also, I’ve been emailing my Spanish host mom this week and it’s making me that much more excited for Spain!  I’m going to be living with two younger girls next fall who aren’t that far off in age from my two little sisters at home.  Even though life in Spain is going to be completely different than life at home, I’m happy that the family structure will be similar to what I’m used to – I’m going to be the oldest of three girls again!  Yay!

Each Hopkins student has also been paired with a Spanish student who studies at the Spanish University that we’re going to be enrolled at this fall.  The Spanish student is there to answer questions before we arrive in Spain and to make sure that we’re adjusting well to life at the Spanish university once we start classes there.  I was paired with my “compañero” earlier this week – he seems really nice, and it’s kind of a relief that I have someone who’s so willing to answer my sometimes ridiculous questions.

I wish Phil could come to Spain

I’m starting to realize how different my life is going to be in less than a month: I’m going to be speaking a different language all the time, living in a completely different culture that I feel really clueless about despite having studied it for several years in school, and living with a family who doesn’t speak English.  On top of all that, I was recently told by my roommate that they probably don’t have strawberry frosted mini wheats in Spain.  Seeing as that’s a staple breakfast/ occasionally dinner food, that’s going to be a tough adjustment.

It still hasn’t hit me that I’m going.  Honestly I don’t think it’s going to hit me that I’m going until I’ve actually boarded the plane, at which point I may or may not have a mini-freak out that I’m about to spend the next 4 months 3000 miles away from home.  I’m sure within a few weeks, Spain will start to feel like a new home, I’ll start to pick up the language, and I’ll adjust to life with my new host family.  And hopefully I’ll also learn to live without mini wheats.

Summer is officially half over.  Currently, I am home in Minnesota until my birthday (the big 2-0!)  Then I’ll be heading back to Baltimore for the rest of summer.  Home means a lot of different things to a lot of different people.  For me, it means sitting on the couch with a 3 lb tub of hummus, some carrots, and my best friend and cat, Pantaloons.

Of course there is a lot more to Minnesota than Costco-sized tubs of hummus and cuddly cats.  Last weekend, I took part in one of the great Minnesotan past-times, the lakeside weekend.  Minnesota boasts the right to be called to home to over 20,000 lakes, creating more shoreline than the coast of Texas.  Of course, a weekend by the lake means lots of sunburn, which I am still recovering from.

Minnesota is also home to the nation’s largest shopping mall, The Mall of America.  For many girls, this is a dangerous place.  Of course, a friend and I had to visit while I was home, but thank goodness I only brought two suitcases home, so that limited the damage.

I guess that’s pretty much all that’s new in my life.  I’ll be home for another week, and then it’s back to Baltimore until further notice.  It seems that the more time I spend out east, the less the Midwest feels like home.  I think eventually it will just become a place, but deep down I’ll maintain some Minnesotan roots.  Just ask me to say the word boat.

Hey everyone!

Summer session one just ended, which means I’m halfway done with organic chemistry and five weeks away from going to Spain for the fall semester!  Yay!

View of the baseball fields on the way to class

So as I mentioned in my last summer blogs, I’ve been spending my summer taking organic chemistry here at Hopkins.  Given orgo’s reputation for being one of the worst courses required for pre-meds, I wasn’t thrilled about having to take it this summer, but it’s actually turned out to be a great class.  The professor, Dr. Klein, went to Hopkins as an undergraduate and took organic chemistry with Dr. Principe, who actually still teaches orgo at Hopkins.  Since then, Dr. Klein has written his own textbook and now teaches orgo at Hopkins during the summers.  During the remainder of the school year, he lives in Israel.  He’s a really, really nice guy and a fantastic teacher.  He’s definitely one of the best lecturers I’ve ever encountered at Hopkins.   Somehow he manages to make a notoriously hard subject completely bearable and keeps us really engaged in the class.  My roommate and I are always joking that there should be a Dr. Klein for every subject.  He’s a really talented professor and I really can’t say enough good things about him.

Aside from orgo, my friends and I are starting to look ahead to the fall semester and are beginning to prepare to go abroad in five weeks (!!!!!!).  Aside from getting our visas, passports, etc, we’re also starting to think about trips that we might want to take around Europe during our time there.  Since travel throughout Europe is reasonably priced, we’re trying to plan a few trips to take advantage of our semester there and to see more of the continent than just Madrid.  So far I’m planning to meet up with one of my high school friends in Austria where she’ll be studying next fall, and we’re planning to take the train from there to Munich for Octoberfest!  Another potential trip in the works is going to Barcelona with another Hopkins girl who is going on the same program in Madrid as I am.  Aside from these trips, there are several trips actually built into our program.  As part of the Spanish Culture and Civilization course that we’re required to take while we’re there, we travel to several cities throughout Spain like Cordoba, Granada, Salamanca, Segovia, and Toledo.  It all still seems so surreal at this point: I’ve never even been to Europe and now all of the sudden I’m going to be living there for five months and seeing all of these places.  So weird.

Lovely screenshot of my sister that I took in our last Skype sesh. She's going to love me for putting this up here.

I’ll give more updates on the Spain preparations later this month and in August.  It’s all very overwhelming right now: I still need to practice my Spanish A LOT since I’m basically a mess right now since I haven’t taken Spanish in so long.  Also, I need to write to my host family, buy a suitcase that can actually fit more than a week’s worth of clothes and that doesn’t have Hawaiian flowers on it (not sure what I was thinking when I picked out my current duffel bag back in middle school…), and I need to start thinking about what classes I’m going to register for at Universidad Carlos III next fall.  This is getting to be a lot to do on top of orgo.

Also, last weekend, I came back home to Philadelphia to celebrate the fourth of July with my family, which was really cool because I only see them like twice a year.  The highlight of the weekend was definitely setting off fireworks in our driveway, which my little sister just told me is still stained blue and orange from about a week ago.  Hopefully that goes away soon…..

Here are some pictures.  Happy belated fourth!

Every summer has a list of favorite things that define that summer.  I’ve been thinking a lot about what defines Summer ’11, and this is what I’ve come up with.

1. Baltimore, Maryland 21210

This is my first summer spent at Hopkins.  Even thought I’ve lived here for the great part of 2 years, my zip code just changed.  It went from 21218 to 21210 after I moved into my new apartment.  Anyways, obviously Baltimore has to be a favorite thing that defines my summer.

1. Home cooked meals

All right, they aren’t quite the same as your mother’s meals, but I am home cooking.  Since, I moved to Hopkins to amount of food eaten from restaurants skyrocketed.  Now that I have a nice kitchen with a (gas!) stove, I have been working a lot on my cooking skills.  I even bought a few cookbooks.  So far my favorite foods to make are pizza, pumpkin pancakes, veggie burgers, and ice cream sundaes.

1. Coloring in the green Thumb

For the past two years I have tried my hand at indoor gardening, which has always ended in failure and mourning.  Now that I have a balcony, I thought I would get gardening one last shot by planting cherry tomatoes, roma tomatoes, and various herbs.  So far so good, so maybe summer ’11 is the summer for gardening.  I really hope I get tomatoes by the beginning of the semester.  Fingers crossed!

1. New Hair

If you knew me in high school, you would have noticed my hair changed color about every other week.  Now that I am in college I’ve slowed that progression in look.  However, last week I figured it was time for a change, so I grabbed the ‘ol green handled scissors and cut myself some bangs.  It was time for a change, so I gave myself one.

1. Home

Last but not least, my favorite thing about summer will be home.  I’m so excited to head home on the 4^th of the July to be reunited with my parents and sisters.  It will be the first time in a year that we will all be together, so I am really excited for just that alone.  Although I’ll be back before the month is over, I am so anxious to get home and spend some time with my family before returning to Baltimore.

So that’s all that makes the list for favorite things of Summer ’11.

Hey everyone! I’m still writing from Paris—it’s crazy that over a month has already gone by of my program. I’ve gotten completely in a routine here, and I’d like to say that I’m adjusting well. One thing I will admit that is a bit difficult in Paris is full language immersion. Since Paris is so touristy, many people speak English and are eager to practice their English. I’m eager to practice my French, however, so it can be hard at times to force myself to develop my language skills and to feel comfortable enough speaking despite my foreign accent. Now that so much of my time here has flown by, I’ve been especially working to improve my French since the time remaining is limited.

At the Orangerie

At Monet's garden in Giverny

As I’ve mentioned in earlier posts, I’m taking a French culture class here (called “Paris Aujourd’hui,” or “Paris Today”), which has been interesting. We’ve been reading plays and learning about French gastronomy, music, and the performing arts. My internship has complemented my coursework quite nicely, since I’m interning in the visual arts sector with a contemporary art gallery in the Marais. The Marais has probably come to be one of my favorite areas in Paris. It’s an artsy quarter full of art galleries, “bobo” (bourgeois bohemian) cafés, and cool vintage clothing stores. It’s also home to the “best falafel of Europe,” a small yet amazing falafel stand called L’As du Falafel!

At the Centre Pompidou

Mirror and sound installation at the Pompidou

The art gallery I work at is in a great location, full of young, successful locals that are somehow involved in the thriving Parisian art-dealing scene. I am an intern, so a lot of my work is clerical, but that is to be expected with any internship position. I only work with my supervisor, who owns and runs the gallery entirely by himself, and it’s been neat working in a smaller more intimate setting. I feel like I am less removed from the process of art dealing since I’m essentially the only other employee at the gallery, I’ve been fortunate enough to really get an in depth look into how art galleries work.

Recognize this Delacroix painting from Coldplay's album art?

Michelangelo's Dying Slave at the Louvre

I’ve gotten to meet the artists, who will come by occasionally to meet with my boss on new projects or expositions. I’ve also had the opportunity to meet important collectors, who come by chance or sometimes by appointment. There are people who are consistent buyers or collectors, and others who visit the gallery much like it is a museum and want to learn about contemporary art. It’s been interesting to witness firsthand the two sides of successfully running an art gallery. Before my internship, I assumed that art was sold on the premise of being “good art,” as deemed by art critics, etc. While this is partly true, there is also a more prominent commercial dimension to running an art gallery than I previously thought. Art dealers sort of gamble with artists and their works, and when they agree to feature a a particular artist in a particular show, they are doing so with the expectation that the art will sell, that is to say, the art will appeal to consumer tastes. A lot of consumer tastes are shaped by the material aspect of art sales—the price tag. Collectors of our day tend to associate price with artistic integrity, and the job of the gallery has essentially become reconciling art with big business. As my boss says, the main job of art gallery is to promote artists and to serve as the intermediary between artists and collections. But at the heart of contemporary art sales, he says, is learning to strike a harmonious balance between the more financial aspect of art sales and the actual artistic aspects. I’m learning a lot at my internship, but am still unsure if I could see myself doing this career-wise, much farther down the road. Internships are a great way to assess whether or not a particular line of work is right for you, but they also don’t provide the full picture because the duties of an intern are much different than an actual employee. I’m hoping by the end of my internship and the completion of the report I have to write about it for my program, I’ll at least have some direction (or more than I have now!) of what I may want to do in the future. Until then, I plan on taking full advantage of my time in Paris, one of the most impressive art capitals of the world. And I hope that my experiences here will relate to some of my classes next semester!

the Louvre

Thanks for reading! -BK

In my last blog entry, I talked about the apartment search process that I went through this past year that led me to my current apartment.  However, finding an apartment is only half of the process behind settling into your new place: the move itself can also get a little bit complicated.  Luckily, my roommate was completely on top of everything that needed to be worked out in order to move our stuff from Charles Commons to our new apartment.  Without his organization, I would have completely overlooked a lot of details and move-in day wouldn’t have gone nearly as smoothly.

Walking to class

First of all, my roommate, Alec, is one of my best friends at Hopkins.  We both lived in Wilson House in AMR I, and we were both on the fourth floor of Charles Commons this year.  So far our roommate situation has worked out extremely well: we both wake up way earlier than would be considered normal for a college student, we’re both a little obsessive about keeping everything clean, and we both have short attention spans and take frequent study breaks to chat.

Alec, being the super organized person that he is, has been the entire reason that this move-in went smoothly.  Last spring, he had already made arrangements for us to get used furniture from Hopkins seniors (now graduates), which saved us a trip to Ikea and a ton of time.  He also noticed that our move-in date was the week after summer session started (we’re both at Hopkins taking organic chemistry) and made me aware of the fact that I needed to find a place to stay during the first week of orgo.  So basically, Alec had a handle on this whole move-in thing way before move-in day even came.

The morning of move-in day, my parents came down to Baltimore from Philly with a car full of stuff to move and were less than thrilled when they found out that everything needed to be moved up to the 14^th floor, where our room was.  However, Alec saved the day again and reserved the building’s freight elevator and a couple of carts to make the move a million times easier.  Moving the furniture around once it was already in the room actually took longer than moving everything up fourteen floors thanks to that elevator.

studying for orgo

Although we thought we were being pretty proactive by bringing along basic cleaning supplies instead of buying them after move-in day, we realized that we forgot a few crucial things.  For example, we were so used to getting toilet paper from Charles Commons every week that it didn’t faze us to go out and buy it for our apartment.  We also realized that since the apartment is much bigger than our dorm rooms, the lamps that we’ve had in our dorms for the past two years don’t really light up the apartment as well as we’d hoped.  Also, just because the apartment has more electrical outlets than a dorm room doesn’t mean that a power strip isn’t necessary: you still might want to plug your phone, computer, iPod, and alarm clock into the same general area, so a power strip definitely makes things easier.

However, one thing we did not forget was groceries, which I’m very thankful for because it was so much easier to bring them all to the apartment in my parents’ car than it would have been to walk to the grocery store and carry everything back ourselves.  It’s going to be an adjustment cooking for ourselves instead of having the dining halls close by, but we’ve been doing pretty okay so far.

So far we’ve had a couple of minor bumps in the road, like the dishwasher breaking and no internet service, but those things were quickly fixed and we’re still loving the apartment.  I have to admit that I was a little freaked out by the idea of living away from university housing and paying my own bills instead of just a room/board fee, but now I absolutely love living off campus.  Dorm life was great, but living in an apartment is a great change of pace and I’m sure will be a huge part of my college experience.

It appears that the Baltimore heat wave has passed, at least for this week.  After a few weeks of sweltering heat and bipolar, scattered torrential rains, the sun is shining at a lovely eighty degrees.

In my first few weeks at my new lab job not much has happened.  It’s a lot of training, doing a little work then patiently waiting for feedback so you can do a little more week.  All in all, it’s slower than expected.

The foreboding view from my place.

Underclassmen summers are hard.  There are a few options that us underclassmen have.  One is to go home, back to life like it was pre-college.  Get a normal teenage job.  Bum around for three months.  Another is to take courses.  That’s what I did last summer.  It’s great if you’re in need of credits, but, in many ways, sadly I’m not.  Lastly, an underclassman can scrounge for any sort of research or internship they can get their hands on.  That’s what I’m doing this summer.

Unfortunately, I’m not as busy as I would hope.  I’ve been living in a lovely three bedroom, three bathroom apartment all by myself.  Trying to keep myself entertained can be difficult.  Luckily, I have my friend JHU_Greco around to keep me some company.

This past week my GRE Math Subject Test study book came in the mail.  At about three inches thick, this book covers everything from pre-calculus (which dates back to my sophomore year of high school) to topics I haven’t quite covered yet, abstract algebra.  My hope is to get through this book this summer so I can take the exam in November and score high enough that if I want to get a PhD in math, it’s an option.  After reading eight pages into the pre-calculus section, I dozed off.  Nothing quite puts me to sleep like conic sections.  Unlike the SAT, this exam does not allow calculator or scratch paper.  You write directly into the exam booklet.  Like the SAT, it’s scored as +1 point for every question write and -1/4 point for every wrong answer.  In that respect, you receive a raw score just like your normal SAT scores.  However, they take this raw score and scale it based on the performance of the other test takers, this is the score that matters.  My book tells me if you answer roughly 2/3 of the questions right, that places you in the top 25%.  What does that mean?  This is exam isn’t taken by all university undergraduates, unlike the SAT, which is taken by most high schoolers.  This exam is specifically for those who want a PhD in math, so I think it’s cliental is a little more competitive.  All in all, after reading pages of vague numerical mumbo-jumbo, I really don’t know what I should be aiming for, and what a score means.  The test is only offered three times a year, twice in the fall, once in the spring.  My goal is to take it as soon as I finish my math degree so I can recall as much information as possible.

Overall, I’ve done a whole lot of think, and not much studying.  It was the same story for my SAT’s.  Studying for standardize tests never really appealed to me, but I think this time I should do it.

I was never one for standardized tests.  I took the SATs, as well as all the required exams for high school graduation.  However, as public school-raised academic in the era of No Child Left Behind, it felt like every few months there was a standardized test scheduled into our school days.  To be completely honest, once I found out these exams weren’t required for graduation, I simply stopped showing up to take them.  I by no means mean to input any sort of political flavor to this blog.  I am just saying I detest all varieties of standardized testing.

Frozen yogurt has made an appearance near campus. Finally, I may have a way to twart my addiction to ice cream.

I am a part of an undergraduate academic community, which is very motivated and competitive.  By the time you reach junior year, sometimes even before then, the words MCAT, LSAT, and GRE get thrown around a lot.  Let’s just face it, we’re students with big goals, and those often include graduate studies.  Unfortunately, those exams are important, they are the NBA finals of academics, the Olympics of college.  You train.  You practice.

I’ve never trained for an exam like this.  I’ve never practiced.  So beyond this being my first summer spent at Hopkins, it is also my first summer spent studying for an exam like this.  All I can hope for is that it will pay off.