senioritis

senioritis i never really had senioritis in high schoolâ€"it was probably the surprising amount of momentum behind me, but i dont think i managed to pull off the effortlessly forget to turn in an assignment thing. so i had grand visions for senioritis in college. i would go out all the time! do my homework never! stay up forever! walk around in my bathrobe all day! i didnt really think senioritis this semester would turn out to be less about me and more about helping others. a friend recently shared the idea of positive workâ€"even if you feel like you arent making a stitch in the cosmic fabric of the universe, you certainly can do positive work for someone. there is enough positive work for you to do until you find a bit of personal direction. the moment i realized it was okay for my last semester to not be about me, the more i was able to do. so in no particular order, the things ive done in the past few weeks stage makeup for mirchi, an bollywood/fusion dance group who performed at south asian showdown last weekend. GLITTER FOR DAYS helped make (read: stirred things)  midnight meals with my boyfriend for his fraternity double checked if snow is cold (it is) made cake pops for my sororitys philanthropy event tried to share the little things that make me laugh helped plan our sorority retreat stuffed my face at boston restaurant week two nights in a row helped plan our senior toast as part of class council to celebrate less than 100 days left at MIT! a few days ago i remembered helping my (sorority) little (sister) on a project she needed to finish desperately. i made the (then seemingly impossibly difficult) choice to sit my butt down on her linoleum floor for a few hours to help her out, mumbling that it would be worth it compared to the other work i had on my plate. today, i dont even remember what else i had to do. im hoping the rest of my (and your) senior year pans out like that. Senioritis Im not going to lie; being a senior pretty much rocks. Im only taking three classes this term, and the grade in all of them is based almost entirely on tests so basically I have three tests, a pset, and possibly a paper between me and graduation. Not to mention that my grad school only cares that I actually graduate, and is completely uninterested in the actual grades I get this term. (I wish I could be all badass and be like Im getting straight Ds, baby! because wouldnt it be cool to not care at all for one time in my life? In reality, I may very well get my first 5.0 at MIT, because Im not as good at slacking off as I try to pretend I am. I give up.) Since I dont have that much schoolwork, Ive had crazy amounts of free time recently. Not that Ive really done anything earth-shattering with them. Some things I have done recently Go shopping. Adam and I went to the Cambridgeside Galleria on Friday. I wanted to buy towels and bedsheets for our new apartment. Adam wanted to buy Brain Age for his Nintendo DS. He won; we bought the game, but didnt find any suitable (read: cheap) towels. I have nonetheless been kicking his ass in the game, so maybe he didnt win in the end. Get furniture. MIT dorm rooms come furnished with beds, mattresses, desks, and shelving, so Ive never had to own furniture before. But Adam and I are moving to Westgate at the end of the month, and suddenly we have to buy things like a bed and a mattress and a microwave. Furniture is expensive! Get fit. Cheerleading practice is over for the year (and, I mean, forever for me), so I figure I have to start some sort of exercise routine and stick with it before it becomes summer and I laze out on the couch and eat potato chips in the air conditioning. All you warm-climate kids are probably like oh my lord, Boston is freezing and to that I say, as a public service announcement: not in the summer its not. And every year I wait until like June 1 to start my exercise program, and I quit around June 15 because its too hotttttt and Im too lazyyyyyy. But since I am no longer going to be a college athlete, I think Id better start exercising now or Ill gain the First Year of Graduate School Fifteen. (I gained the Freshman Negative Five when I came to MIT. Join a club sport! Its good for you!) Watch absurd amounts of TV. Jomar 06 bought the first season of Lost recently, and basically our entire entry watched the whole season on Saturday and Sunday. And then Adam and I downloaded all of season 2 from iTunes. And before that, we read most of the episode recaps from Television Without Pity. Im officially addicted, but on the upside, so is everybody with whom I live. Not do so hot in lab. I went in today to image some neurons I prepared last week on the labs worth-more-than-my-life confocal microscope, and they looked like crap. I cannot even tell you how mad that makes me, especially since I would really like to get my project finished up before I graduate and leave the lab. So I came home and made meatcubes and garlic bread and spaghetti, because even if my neurons suck, my cooking is awesome. Some public service announcements These are just some things Ive heard people asking here and there. If you have any other questions, as always, please feel free to ask. Does it cost extra to stay in the dorms over IAP? Do the dorms close for winter and spring breaks? No, IAP tuition and housing is included in your payment for the entire year. It doesnt cost anything extra to stay on campus for the month of January, except for what you consume in food, I guess. The dorms dont close for winter or spring breaks; if you so desired, you could stay in the dorm from the end of August to the end of May and never move a muscle. It does cost extra money to stay in the dorms over the summer. Where does one buy MIT textboooks? The Coop definitely sells textbooks, but they mostly sell said textbooks at a much higher price than other vendors. However, sneaky persons that they are, they dont release the names/ISBNs of books needed for class anywhere but at the Coop itself. (Smart, eh?) What I usually do is go to the Coop, write down the ISBNs of the books I need for classes, then use a book search engine like this one to see how the prices online + shipping compare to the Coops prices. If I know someone whos taken one of my classes, Ill go see if they want to sell the book too. (There used to be a website where MIT students bought and sold their used textbooks, but it closed down and like five sites replaced it. No one site has emerged as the clear leader in the MIT used book business.) Usually I end up ordering most of my books online and buying the ones with a negligible price difference from the Coop. Particularly for freshman classes, its useful to ask the sophomores/juniors around you if they still have their GIR books most are happy to be rid of them for a few bucks. Should I do an FPOP? Yes. FPOPs are fun, and theyre a great way to meet some of your new classmates. Whats the deal with the meal plan? You or someone with money puts money into your TechCash account, which is linked from your MIT ID card. When you want to buy some food somewhere on or around campus, you get your card swiped and the amount is subtracted from your balance. You want food, you pay money. Its kind of like real life. ;) You can add money at any time, so dont worry too much about estimating the exact amount youll need per semester if you pay too much fall semester, it will just stay in your account for use later. When can I get my MIT email address? Okay, I know you all want to get MIT Facebook accounts. Deep breaths. As Matt said recently: Youll receive everything you need for an email address in the Next Big Mailing, set to go out in a couple weeks. In the meantime, you might start thinking about what youd like your user ID to be (you get to pick) keeping in mind that this email address will be seen by all your friends, professors, and future employers/grad school admissions committees. Many people at MIT get their nicknames from their usernames. Choose wisely! Other questions 1. Chaine asked, How do you schedule your UROP hours? Ive noticed in the course catalog that some departments (like 10 and 22) offer a joint BS and MS. Your thoughts? Like how feasible? When I finalize my class schedule for the term, I look at the open spots and fit in as many hours as I want to for my UROP, then give the schedule to my postdoc, who sticks it up behind his computer. Not too terribly complicated. :) I try to schedule my classes in the morning so I have most of the afternoon free to work in the lab for example, my schedule for last term is here and the one from last spring is here. A lot of people at MIT do five-year bachelors/masters programs, although most of them do it in course 6. To my knowledge, its not a great deal harder, but it does involve being sure you want a masters degree in your subject pretty much by the end of sophomore year, which is not something about which everybody is sure. But if youre sure you want that masters degree, I think a five-year program is a super thing to do. 2. Anonymous commented, As my EC told me, International students are a level up from domestic students( I am considered domestic myslef but I attended high school abroad :D) how do you feel that?? did you realize it?? In my experience, there arent really groups of MIT students who are more special or less special than others. We all take the same classes, and we all do the same work. Once you get to MIT, it doesnt really matter what your background is, and people dont even notice after a few weeks who went to public school, or private school, or school abroad, or who got a perfect score on the SAT. International students help domestic students on problem sets, and vice versa because theyre not international or domestic anymore, theyre just MIT students. 3. Dimitri (10) :) asked, I have some small questions and you seem to be the most appropriate person to ask. My first dorm choice would be McGregor and I too love to be organized. I would love to have a file cabinet in my dorm. Is that allowed? Will I be able to find one in campus? (possibly for free?) I would hate living in a dirty room. Will we have cleaning supplies at our disposition? Are the floors made from carpet? Does that carpet gets dirty/dusty fast? You are more than welcome to have a filing cabinet in your room. Its possible that you could find one for free you can add yourself to an email list called reuse, which will inform you when theres stuff around campus for the taking. People get computer parts and other kinds of equipment on reuse all the time. In MacGregor, we have access to an entry vacuum cleaner; Im not positive that other dorms have things like that, but they probably do. Our floors are covered in carpet, and I like to vacuum mine at least once a week it doesnt get terribly dirty, but it does get crumbs and dust and hair all over it. I actually own my own little Dustbuster, which I bought on sale at Target, and which is just the right size for a dorm room. 4. XYZ asked, International students go back to their home country in summer. Still you feel that they will be able to manage loan component of their self help? Please guide me. Its certainly possible to make enough money if you stay at MIT for the summer (perhaps doing a UROP); many students dont spend a great deal of time at home once theyre in college. I think it will be a little more clear how youd like to spend your summer after youve been in school for a little while. 5. Fei asked (about MacGregor) Hey Mollie, how many people share a room, or all of them are single rooms? Yup, all the rooms in the dorm are singles.