Writing Central Baltimore

Last semester, we published an article, "Filling the Hole in the Donut," in the University of Baltimore magazine about UB's involvement in revitalizing Central Baltimore. It's the area just north of campus, between MICA to the west, Johns Hopkins to the north and Greenmount Cemetery to the east--and long neglected, it's sorely in need of some assistance to again become the thriving area it once was.

UB, along with several other organizations--one of which includes the Central Baltimore Higher Education Collaborative--is involved in the area, investing time and resources as a "community engaged" institution to redeveloping and reviving the community. Now Jane Delury, a lecturer in the School of Communications Design, has teamed up with Tristan Davies, a senior lecturer in the Writing Seminars at Johns Hopkins, to offer Writing Central Baltimore this past semester.

home stretch

while reading the last two posts from marni and charlene, i giggled. i couldn't help myself. i'm delirious... it's nearly the end of the semester. i have precisely two more tuesdays to get through to finish. one presentation and two finals to go. and then...

i am a fail whale

if you're not on twitter, you may not know what the fail whale is, which is probably a good thing. twitter is highly addictive; don't join it if you value your time :) i find it a little ironic/amusing/aggravating that as i write this, the fail whale is taunting me. "too many tweets" is exactly how i'm feeling at the moment. i've reached the point in the semester where i'm constantly freaking out about everything

Grrr.... finding pieces that don't exist :/

Question: As a publication design major we are expected to take Portfolio in our final semester at UB... the idea is to take projects we have create during our time here and 'perfect' them to use in our portfolio to present to clients... that being said, how does anyone really expect to find suitable pieces for a portfolio if most of the assignments we have been given during our UB career have been just projects? Most not suitable for presentation to a client? I'd like to hear other views and opinions on this, because I am quite irritated that teachers look at our work and say that most of it cannot be used because it was not work suitable (for example: fruit crate labels?). Why not give students assignments that they'll be able to use for portfolio pieces to present to clients? I think some of the syllabuses need to be revised drastically so that students have more options to work with for their last class... thoughts and opinions???

12 weeks...

Yes, I am counting down the weeks LOL. After this week, there are about twelve weeks left in the semester... which, to me, means a lot because I am on course to graduate in the spring... YAY!!! I find that it is not as easy to get back into the swing of completing assignments and doing readings without too much procrastination than I thought... it is always so much easier to just wait until the last minute, than to just do it early and get it over with and out of the way. Where is the motivation? Where is the drive? My guess is that is was left on the stage at my undergrad ceremony... but it must come back at some point.

Not enough time...

As a graduate student I sometimes feel that there is just not enough time to do anything... the average graduate student has a fulltime job and may very well have a family. So on top of the work for their job, coming home to prepare dinner and make sure the house is tiddy, we also have to find time to do our assignments... where is the time for just doing you? The social life might as well go out the window, an assignment needs to be revised... AGAIN! and of course htere are times when you work you a$$ off to revise it (doing just about everything the teacher said) and there is still no grade change... wtf is the point is there would be absolutly no change!? At this point in the semester, I'm tired and all I want is a passing grade... once the 4.0 has gone, you kinda stop striving so much to maintain it (cause you really never will get it back to 4)... why go through all the hassle? It's the end of the semester and I just want to chill and be done with it... May 2010 hurry up! I'm tired and I don't want to be in school anymore... All I know is that piece of paper beter pay off in the long run... if not, I'm going to be a little upset... can I get a refund? LOL

Term Options

Coming from a university with more term options to take courses, I wonder how much better would UB be if they did the same?... right now, there are only courses offered in the fall, spring and summer terms. Other schools offer minimester (which is during the winter break after Christmas) and some offer multiple summer terms, ranging from two week course, to seven or nine week course throughout the majority of the summer. I think having more term options would be appealing to a perspective student and to current ones. They would have more options to be able to finish their degree requirements and wouldnt be bound to just the three terms offered. But I guessit's because UB is not as large a scale school as some other universities and colleges are, they are not able to do so... but golly gee! If they could?... I probably would have been the first to sign up for those classes and finish school sooner than later.

Does anyone know what the score is?

Ok... so last semester I took my first (and last!) Sunday class... OMG... I missed a full semester of going to church and everyone else in class was a little pissed about missing so many Ravens games. A six hour class is bad enough as is it, but for it to be on Sunday, in the afternoon (12pm to 5:50pm) AND during football season (and my usual after service nap time LOL) that was just not cool at all! :(

I must admit, the teachers were pretty darn cool though... we had two completely opposite generations teaching us (one taught the other, how cool is that to see those perspectives?) their teaching style was on point and very helpful for the coursework... if you're wondering what class, it's Words & Images... but still, even after the good lessons... IT IS MY SUNDAY GONE... le sigh... at least I passed and won't have to take it again :o)

But something must be done about this... or not... any suggestions?