MU Honors Program: Student Blog

Hi everyone!

My name is Kori Austera, and I’m a senior Harrison Scholar with a double major in English Literature and German. I’m involved with Honors Ambassadors, the Miami Student, research through the Honors Program, Delta Phi Alpha (German Honorary Society), and I’ve been on the exec board for the gymnastics club for three years. In addition, I coach gymnastics both at home and at Miami, and I’m a rated judge through level 8. Last semester, I studied at the Ludwig-Maximilians Universität in Munich, Germany through the Junior Year in Munich program, where I began some research for what I hope will become my German departmental honors thesis. I also like to play piano, do sudoku puzzles, and work out at the rec. In other words, I am over-involved and over-committed, and I love every moment of it!

I’m always willing to answer questions about Miami, Honors/Harrison, or college life in general, so feel free to leave a comment, and I’ll try to get back to you!

Exciting News!!

I have some exciting news: I have plans for the future!

Earlier this week, I sent confirmation emails to accept a Fulbright English Teaching Assistantship to Germany. The grant covers approximately ten months, but it’s also possible to arrive early.

I’m honestly still flabbergasted. It’s an incredible honor. My thoughts have ranged everywhere from excited to terrified to nervous to thrilled and to having a serious case of imposter syndrome.

My path to Fulbright began over a year ago, about the same time that I began to suffer senior year induced anxiety. Halfway through the semester, I spent a week wandering around the English department and asking professors what they did immediately after college. One professor told me that she lived in France and Germany and also traveled throughout eastern Europe.

“Have you thought about teaching English abroad?” she asked.

I hadn’t, but it seemed like a perfect combination of my two majors (English Literature and German).

Last summer, I spent most of my time working on my Undergraduate Summer Scholars project, researching graduate schools, and prepping for the GRE, but I took about an hour or two each week to draft a statement of purpose and a project proposal for Fulbright. By the time August rolled around, my essays were in good shape, and as soon as I moved back to campus, I found my three recommenders.

All Miami applicants had to submit their applications to the campus advisor by October 1^st, and we had campus interviews the following week. I believe there were 15 of us who submitted an application.

Three months later (January 29^th), we learned the results from the first round of cuts: six Miami students’ applications were sent to commissions in other countries and to the FSB (Fulbright Foreign Scholarship Board).

About two weeks later, I got an email with an additional application: all Germany ETA applicants had to translate their original essays into German. Not a horrible request, except for one thing: we had 2 weeks. I spent an entire week with my dictionary, sent my essays to a German professor and to my dad’s German co-worker for proofreading, and managed to finish 3 days before the postmark deadline. Whew!

And then we waited some more.

Since both of my classes are 2½ hours, we take a 10 minute break after the first hour and a half. I checked the unofficial Fulbright Google spreadsheet to see if there were any updates, and three Germany ETAs had posted their results. After class, I called my brother at home and demanded that he check the mailbox:

“You have… um, a magazine.”

“That’s it?”

“Um... here’s another envelope.”

(Oh. Small envelopes are not a good sign, especially when the spreadsheet tells you that the acceptances come in manila envelopes.) “How big is it?”

“It’s, like, one of those, like, yellow things.”

Since then, I’ve made contact with a few other Germany ETAers, and we’ve chatted a little about our backgrounds in German, our general interests, and our goals for the future. I also spent a few wonderfully fun days in my doctor’s office and at a local lab, getting poked and injected for the medical clearance.

Wow. It still doesn’t feel real.

Still around!

Wow, sorry for the 4 month break—this has been a busy semester!

This has been a pretty interesting semester so far: the workload in graduate classes is a little heavier than I had expected. Graduate classes are very different from undergrad classes, mostly in good ways. The level of conversation is higher; students always read for class; we ask each other about research interests… it’s great!

In my last blog, I mentioned that I’m living at home. How’s that going? Well, it’s quite different when you’re not living in a dorm with 40 other people.

The Bad

• 1.    My social life is non-existent. I love my little gym buddies, but coaching 6- to 12-year-olds is just not the same as being at college!
• 2.    Sharing a bathroom with my brother. It was much easier sharing 2 showers and 2 toilets with 17 other women than it is for 2 of us to share one bathroom.
• 3.    I spend almost 4 hours/week driving to and from class… more if the weather is bad. Driving is not my favorite thing in the world.
• 3.5. Buying gas constantly.
• 4.    I can’t do laundry at 2 AM without getting in trouble the next day.
• 5.    I miss being able to walk everywhere.

The Good

• 1.    Laundry does not cost $1.25/load!
• 2.    Air conditioning and heat that I can control.
• 3.    Hanging out at home.
• 4.    My parents are great cooks. We’ve been experimenting with cookie recipes this semester, so it’s probably a good thing that I’m still doing gymnastics.
• 5.    It’s a quieter environment. I can make tea in the comfort of my own kitchen. 

Hmmm, sorry about the formatting; I compose posts in Word and then transfer them to typepad, and it doesn't always work correctly.

Commuting to campus might not have been the best idea that I’ve ever had, but I’m so glad that I chose to stay an extra semester!! 

My experience in Honors

QOTD: <I was just wondering if you could tell me more about your personal experiences in the Honors Program so that I would have a better understanding of the program. If you know anyone else that would be willing to tell me more about the Honors program please let me know.>

Before I start, I want to point out that Honors has changed quite a bit since I entered as a freshman. During my first few years, Honors focused primarily on what you do and what you accomplish. I think you can see an obvious difference in the current focus—now, the emphasis is on how you think.

Students in my year had to meet 10 Honors experiences—7 were course experiences, 2 were non-course experiences, and 1 could be from either category. Now, you need to complete 12 experiences, but more activities count toward Honors experiences. In theory, you could have knocked out all of the requirements in two years without ever reaching what is now Tier 3. I actually finished 9 experiences by the end of my sophomore year. Less than a fourth of the students in my class ended up writing a thesis and graduating Honors with Distinction, but I think this will change now that students have to take Tier 3 experiences. The new program is built around students’ interests—really, it’s built by students’ interests.

Anyway, back to your question. Let’s see… where to start?

Like every Honors student, I took Honors courses (my favorite one was Folk and Literary Fairy Tales). I also did a course extension for a seminar on German literature after the fall of the Berlin Wall and have UAed for three classes. Right now, I’m looking forward to defending my honors thesis and taking two graduate courses next semester.

I also lived in Honors housing for four years—Tappan as a freshman and then three years in Bishop—and that was one of the best decisions that I made at Miami. I had a group of dorm friends as a freshmen, and we ended up living next door to each other in Bishop as seniors. We also rented a house together between our sophomore and junior years. It was great; we played Apples to Apples every night! One is in graduate school, another is in medical school, one will start medical school next year, and another is in law school. Aww, they’re so accomplished!

My friends say that it’s worth being in Honors just for priority registration. This is probably why so many of us have double majors and why 98% of students graduate within 4 years.

I’m a little unusual in the Honors community because I have also seen the administrative side—I worked at the front desk in the Honors office for almost two years, answering the phone, carrying tubs of applications from Admissions to the office, filing said applications, and giving myself a lot of paper cuts. Also, I was a student representative on one of the Honors faculty committees for three years.

For me, being in Honors was absolutely the right decision. Honors gave me the encouragement that I needed to become more involved in campus activities and to approach professors. However, Honors did not create my experience; I had to be self-motivated and a little assertive to take advantage of some of these opportunities.

If you have any more questions, please ask! You can also contact Honors Ambassadors by going to the main Honors site and clicking on “Who’s in MU Honors?”. Each student has a profile that includes their interests and their contact information.

Finals Week Procrastination

WOW—I’ve gone the whole semester without any updates. Sorry about that!

Where to start?

This was supposed to be my last semester at Miami, but it’s actually not. I planned to graduate after finishing my undergraduate requirements this semester (4 more English classes, and I’m also taking French and a class for Scholar Leader), but it turns out that two of my favorite English professors are teaching graduate courses next semester. Even though I’m taking these classes for graduate credit, I am still enrolled as an undergrad because I would have to go through an additional petition process if I were a non-enrolled student. That’s a little disappointing—I really, really wanted a red or green parking pass!

I guess this would be a good time to mention that undergraduates are allowed to take graduate courses through the Senior Permission program, and this counts as an Honors experience. You need 112 credit hours, a 3.0 in the department in which the class is listed, a 2.75 overall GPA, and a few other requirements, none of which are especially difficult to meet. Well, unless your name is Kori, and your ability to run into weird problems is seriously unsurpassable. It’s kind of a long story, but I got permission from the Dean of the Graduate School to take both classes after I supplied a little extra paperwork. Lesson learned: some requirements can be flexible. :) (Shh! I didn’t tell you that!)

Well… time to race toward the end of the semester. Two papers down, two papers and two exams to go.

 

Question of the Day: “What benefits do you get by being in (Honors)?”

I just did an informal and unscientific survey of my friends, and we all agreed that priority registration is amazing. When you're majoring in a popular subject, it's really nice to be able to choose your classes without needing back-ups. I’ve also really enjoyed most of my Honors classes (my favorite one was Folk and Literary Fairy Tales). A lot of the biggest benefits aren’t directly coupled with Honors, but they can count toward the 12 required experiences. For example, I have UAed (a UA is an undergraduate TA) for three classes, I did a course extension in a 400-level German seminar, and I’m currently working on my senior thesis. I also heard a rumor (which may or may not be true, so don’t quote me) that Honors students don’t have to do Miami Plan.

Back to school, back to school

Hey everyone! I’m back on campus and ready for the fall semester! Even though I’m totally ready to talk about classes, clubs, and how excited I am for this semester, I’ll rewind for this entry and discuss this summer.

For May/June/most of July, I participated in Undergraduate Summer Scholars, which allows students to work with a faculty mentor on a research project. I developed my proposal based on a paper that I wrote for a Victorian literature class, and I’m still writing and revising my project. Once I finish writing/deleting/revising/procrastinating/repeat, I’ll be able to use it as a departmental honors project for English (I think…?), as well as for my honors thesis.

After that, I spent a lot of time doing gymnastics, coaching gymnastics, studying for my gymnastics judging test—yeah, I lived in the gym—and going through some vocab for the GRE. For some reason, the more vocab I studied, the lower my verbal score was on the practice tests, and the higher my quantitative score was. Go figure. I know that I’m probably the math-iest and science-iest English/German major ever, but you’d think that studying would have the reverse effect. Fortunately, I took the GRE right before the semester started (and yes, it went very well), and I’ve moved on to more exciting things.

Like the Lit GRE. And personal statements. And statements of purpose. And job applications. And reading. And writing. And attempting to read and write in French (fail). And going on retreats with huge groups of people. And recruiting new freshmen for gymnastics. And meeting everyone in my dorm. And general freaking out about things to write, things to read, places to go, people to see.

I did say that I’m over-involved and over-committed, right?

Welcome to my last semester at Miami.

Also, since there are probably new readers this year, please, please, please leave some feedback about what you'd like to read/learn about Miami/Honors/Harrison/English/German/Pre-Med/Grad school/Gymnastics/The meaning of life.

The end of the year

It’s the end of the academic year… my last year with my dorm friends. They will be going on to new things—one to law school, two to med school, one to graduate school, and others to jobs. And me? I’ll still be here, courtesy of switching my major from Zoology to English. Es lohnt sich.

How do I measure this academic year?

- In frappucinos consumed at 4 AM

- In inadvertently funny quotes

- In circles around a roundabout and in hours in Miami vans

- In questions and answers

- In midnight Shriver runs and in trips to the MacCracken Market

- In interviews, job applications, and scholarship applications

- In time spent in office hours

- In squirrels on the quad

- In naps, both planned and accidental

- In moments of inspiration and hours of writer's block

- In pictures and videos on Facebook

- In hours spent in the gym, and in the number of giants, straddle backs, and series attempts on beam

- In card games and in games of Mafia, and if anyone is reading this, we need to play one last game of Mafia

- In “ahh, I’m almost ready to graduate!” moments of panic

- In pages, sentences, and words (I read 6,238 pages, wrote 124 pages and 40,097 words, spent 26 hours watching assigned films, and spent 4.5 hours leading class discussions, in case anyone was wondering).

- In the number of German words that I have to LEO (yes, I just made that into a verb)

- In group meetings at King and in the Bishop basement

- In love and honor (yeah, I'm getting sentimental now, so I need to stop)

I'm not sure if I'm blogging again next semester, so in the event that I'm not, I also have some people at Miami whom I'd like to publicly thank:

- my German professors, especially Dr. DiDonato and Dr. Sanders, who convinced the financial aid department to fund my study abroad program, and whose efforts led to students being able to use their scholarships on all Miami-approved study abroad programs. Also, thank you to the department for the Marion Lee Miller Award.

- my English professors, who made me feel at home in a new department immediately, and also to the department for nominating me for the Craver-Overton Scholarship. I'd especially like to thank Dr. Powell for being my Summer Scholars advisor; Dr. Minich for letting me be her UA, for taking the time to meet with me every week, and for helping me revise my "Paradise Lost" paper; Dr. Gillespie, who never let me get away with sloppy thesis statements, and who also gets to put up with me as a future UA; and soon-to-be-Dr. Rushford-Spence, who asked me why I wasn't an English major and then dragged me over to the chief undergraduate advisor to talk about upper-level classes.

- the Honors Program, which has provided me with endless opportunities for getting involved at MIami. In particular, thank you to Kari Taylor, who is probably the most approachable person at Miami, and who didn't get mad when I changed her name plate to read "Crusher of Dreams," and Dr. Haynes for her support over the past 4 years.

- Miami Gymnastics, just because they're awesome. At meets, we are the loudest team out there because we genuinely enjoy spending time together and doing the sport that we all love. Everyone else recognizes us for being the loudest and most supportive team out there; we won the Spirit Award at Nationals this year!

- my Bishop friends, all of whom are brilliant and who are going to do amazing things after they graduate and leave me behind. They're going to law school, med school, grad school, ahh! They're awesome.

- my English major friends, who live and write papers in King with me, and who also collect quotes.

- and the Scholar Leader community, which I'm extremely excited to join next year.

Have a great summer!

How to choose a college

My college search started about 8 years ago, when my high school took us on a tour of Purdue. I also went to Ball State’s campus every year in high school for a German competition. By the time my junior year rolled around, my college search was in full swing. I checked out college admissions and college review books from the library, my parents took me on a tour of Indiana University between my sophomore and junior years, and we planned a college tour during the spring break of my senior year.

Eventually, I ended up with a list of 6 schools: Brown (BS/BA degree program), Dartmouth, Indiana, Miami, Wellesley (Early Evaluation), and Yale (Early Action). As you can probably tell, I didn’t have any major criteria besides being on the smaller side (IU was the exception since it was my favorite in-state school, and it has fabulous foreign language programs), so I ended up with schools with a variety of atmospheres, sizes, and strengths. I also emailed and sent recruiting information to the gymnastics coaches at Brown and Yale—I didn’t have the skills to be anything but maybe a floor specialist, but I felt it was worth looking into.

What was missing in that list? More match schools that gave merit scholarships. My guidance counselor had told me that I shouldn’t have trouble getting accepted at top schools; he told me that I was a shoo-in everywhere. (If your counselor tells you that, DON’T believe him/her!)

Fact: the acceptance rates for literally half of my schools were hovering between 10-20%. As an out-of-state student, I also would have only attended Miami if I had received the Harrison scholarship or another significant scholarship. (Additional fact: the acceptance rate for Harrison has been below 5% for at least the past 4 years— that’s lower than Harvard’s acceptance rate!) Therefore, I had 4 reach schools (Brown, Dartmouth, Yale, and Miami/Harrison), 1 match school with no merit-based aid (Wellesley), and 1 safety (Indiana). In retrospect, I’m even a little uncomfortable with considering Wellesley a match school; its acceptance rate is somewhere around 35-40%. This was not a well-balanced list by any means!

Financial aid caveat: the EFC from FAFSA is generally not the amount that families have in mind. Need-blind schools that guarantee to meet 100% of demonstrated need may also “meet your need” with all loans. Sit down with your parents early and have an honest conversation with how much they are willing to pay—and then adjust your list accordingly. I applied before many of the top schools had revamped their financial aid scales; students who apply for need-based aid may have better luck than I did. The financial aid at the most elite schools has improved drastically since I was a senior in high school. Once you have your financial aid packages, compare them and really evaluate the differences in cost. As I mentioned earlier, some schools meet demonstrated need by loans, while others are more generous with grants (this discrepancy is often called “gapping”). I was “gapped” by one college and immediately eliminated it from my list, even though it was definitely one of my top choices.

By the end of my college search, I had visited about 10 schools, but only half of those schools felt “right.” As soon as I got out of the car at these schools, I immediately felt at home. It sounds like such a cliché—and it probably is—but certain schools just felt more comfortable than others.

Once I had my acceptances and financial aid packages in hand, I decided that extra prestige was not worth student loans, so the only schools that I could realistically afford were Indiana and Miami—and they were also the only two colleges on my list that offered merit scholarships. (Of course, financial aid has improved drastically at the most prestigious schools in the past few years, so your mileage may vary).

What can you learn from my admissions experience? My college list was too top-heavy with very questionable financial aid, and I had a reasonable chance of not getting into any school except for IU (and Miami without Harrison). Also, you should be willing to attend EVERY school to which you apply. Even though I didn’t get into every university, I did have a choice between several schools, and I’m very fortunate to attend a school that I love.

To summarize:

1. Choose your schools wisely and apply broadly.
2. Pay attention to the estimated cost of attendance and the average financial aid package.
3. Sit down with your parents to discuss how much they are willing to pay.
4. Compare financial aid packages once they come in.
5. If you don’t love your safety, then it isn’t a safety.

Campus food 101

Campus food is important—you’ll be eating it for two years. I toured some schools where the campus food was a little questionable, but fortunately, Miami has great food! It’s not quite gourmet, but the selection and quality are pretty impressive, and Food Services wins awards every year. When I was looking at colleges, I made sure to pick schools that always had vegetarian/vegan meals (most colleges do, so that wasn't a problem), and it was another plus if all of the ingredients were listed somewhere. Miami's food information is online, and the menus actually show up on Blackboard. How convenient!

Where to eat on campus:

1.  Alexander! It’s too bad that Alexander is wayyyy down on Western because I’d probably go there every day. There are two buffet-style dining halls on campus that have a purely vegetarian option, and Alexander is one of them. Also, I think the salad and fruit bar deserves a mention—where else can you get plain yogurt and choose your own fruit? The Greyhound Market also has an impressive array of organic and vegetarian food.

2.  Bell Tower is closest to where I live, and I go there for probably 80% of my meals. It’s an a la carte dining hall, and there are so many options—well, except on the weekends because most of the options are closed. I’m a fan of their stir fry (choose your own veggies and meat/meat substitute), Miami Spice (pasta dishes), and their veggie burgers deserve a mention, too.

3.  I’d like to rank Panache higher, but it’s a little too expensive for me to eat there every day. If I had to describe Panache, I would call it a semi-upscale restaurant that takes meal plans. My roommate and I try to go there once a semester, and I have to admit that we’re predictable customers—we always go for the Penne Pomodoro.

4.  Hamilton just feels friendly. Like Alexander, it always has vegetarian dishes, but unlike Bell Tower, the dishes can’t be customized. It’s one of the smaller dining halls (probably the smallest a la carte place), but it serves a pretty dedicated clientele, which means that you always seem to run into friends there.

5.    If you want a sub, the best place to go is Scott, even if you have to walk halfway across campus to get there. Scott also makes mini pizzas, which I haven’t actually tried, but their cinnamon bread is great!

6.  For students who live on MET quad (that would include the two Honors freshmen dorms), Harris is the buffet-style hall of choice. Harris is also home to a new Italian “restaurant” (a la carte place), which I’d like to try sometime in the near-ish future.

I'm trying to find out what my readers want to learn about campus... it's a little hard when you only have a known sample size of 2: Jared (the other blogger) and Olivia (his editor/SO, who is also in one of my English classes). Would you prefer to hear more about campus, my life, random musings, or something else?

On gymnastics...

I’ve managed to make it through an entire semester without talking in great detail about one of the most important things in my life: gymnastics. Since no one has suggested a better topic, I think I’ve earned the right to devote a little time to the best sport ever!

After our annual home meet, we have a banquet that recognizes the seniors. It’s a tradition for the juniors to introduce the seniors by describing them by their characteristics, personality, and funny things they say. I’ll skip over our team’s inside jokes and jump right to a slightly revised version of my speech.

When I first started to think about this speech, I couldn’t decide whether I wanted it to be poignant and touching, humorous, serious, or something in-between. Eventually, I decided that my answer was “yes," and like a good English major, I decided to create metaphors for every event. My main goal was to make it through the speech without crying, and I’m happy to announce that all of us made it through in record time without ANY tears.

What gymnastics means to me, event-by-event:

Vault. I think it was the movie “Stick It” that asked who actually likes to run and jump at a stationary object. Sometimes there’s a little flipping and twisting involved, too. Therefore, I think vault is like the obstacles in life that you can’t surpass; you have to face them head-on. Sometimes you hit the board perfectly and fly over all of your problems. At other times, you really intend to deal with a situation, but you actually just smash into the table and fall over. Not so good. Oh well. Once in awhile, you’re really lucky, and you’re able to run to the side of the table (or obstacle) and bypass it altogether. (Of course, I’ve managed to embed the tape measure prongs into my foot while doing this, so this method isn’t totally safe!) The table is kind of unavoidable, and so are tough times in life.

Bars. Taking risks. If you think about what we do on bars… well, sometimes you wish you hadn’t started. We hold onto a bar and swing our bodies around, throw ourselves with reckless abandon from bar to bar, and fly 8 feet in the air and hope we land on our feet. I think of bars as representing the crossroads in life, when choosing one route means giving up another. You can’t let go for a straddle back and say, “Oops! Didn’t mean to do that! Rewind!” and sometimes you have to jump into a new situation with both feet (hands?) and never look back.

Beam represents balance, both figuratively and literally. Gymnasts are probably the best time managers ever, and we use our skills on beam to balance gymnastics with everything else in our lives. I think that’s what makes us so unique—we somehow have time for everything, and we manage to make everything work out for the best. (In my recent RA interview, I was asked how I can devote so much time to my extracurriculars and still do well academically. The answer? I spent 16-20 hours/week in the gym and another 5+ hours/week with my violin under my chin, and my schedule in college seems relatively relaxed in comparison!)

Floor represents doing what you love. Every time I compete on floor, I love all of the support that this team gives during the entire routine. When I graduated from high school, I wasn’t quite sure how I was going to function in a world without gymnastics taking up all of my free time, and somehow I managed to put off functioning in the big and scary “real world” without gymnastics for four years! Gymnastics has been the most amazing support system at college; it’s been the one constant throughout the vast majority of my life, and I’m proud to call myself a Miami gymnast. :) 

Wow! I may have to start writing about gymnastics every week if no one suggests another topic! (I know I had a ton of questions when I was looking at colleges... I'll tackle just about any appropriate subject...)

Everyday life at Miami

Hi. Remember me? I promise I haven’t disappeared… I’m just a little busy this semester and never got around to posting the entries that I had written. Time to start catching up!

As I’ve mentioned before, one of the benefits of being in Honors is that you have priority registration after the first semester—that means that you are almost guaranteed to get into all of your first choice classes! You can choose your favorite professor, the most convenient times, and the best location, and force adding is almost never an issue. While my roommate lucked out this year and only has TR classes (yes, that means she has a 4-day weekend), I wasn’t quite as fortunate… but I don’t have any 8 AM classes!

Because my MWF classes are a little irregular, here is a typical Tuesday/Thursday for me:

8:00- Rudely awakened by my alarm. Blindly poke at my snooze button from a half-prone position until it turns off. Fall asleep.

8:07- BEEP… BEEP… BEEP… open one eye, glare at the alarm, and hit the snooze again.

8:14- Check the time, roll over, and attempt to fall asleep again.

8:21-Get out of bed and get ready for class. Pack bag. Skim through a few passages in my books if necessary.

Note to readers: There is something very comforting about having a snooze button ritual. Setting my alarm for 8:21 just wouldn’t have the same effect! Also, I only recommend having such a ritual if your roommate wakes up before you.

8:50- Grab something for breakfast. I keep granola bars, Cinnamon Toast Crunch (with vanilla soy milk! I seem to remember that being on my list of favorite things!), and Cheerios in my room.

9:00- Run to King Café and buy something for lunch. Bring back to the mini fridge. I’m sure the people at King Café think that I’m totally weird because I buy sandwiches and sushi in the morning, but I don’t have time to stop for lunch.

9:15- Leave for class.

9:30- Class!

11:00- Class!

12:30- UA for a freshman class! (UA= Undergraduate Associate= undergraduate version of a TA. This can count for an Honors B experience, or whatever they call it these days. I’m old-school; I have “course” and “non-course” requirements. J)

1:45- Grab my sandwich/sushi/whatever on the way to…

2:00- Class!

3:30- Return to dorm. Take a brief nap. Extra sleep is never a bad thing.

4:00- Start reading. I’m majoring in English and German; reading is my life.

5:00- Go to the gym to coach. I started coaching when I was 15, and I currently teach two recreational gymnastics classes for our class program.

6:00- Finish coaching and go to Bell Tower for a sandwich or wrap. Return to gym to read.

8:00- Gymnastics—the sport in which you willingly throw yourself at and around inanimate objects! I’ll cover that later…

10:15- Return from practice.

10:45- Read.

Anywhere between 12-3:00- Finish reading! Bed!