After nearly three years here at Tech, some things really piss me off.
First, the people who scrape “T”’s off signs around campus are idiots. This stupid hobby is in no way whatsoever in keeping with the Tech tradition of stealing a T from the Tech tower; it is simply childish vandalism.
Stealing a T off of Tech Tower was an accomplishment because it took engineering skills to somehow get on the roof, remove a large, and probably heavy, lit letter and not fall off and die. Using a razor blade to remove a “t” from the Instructional Center sign requires the use of a razor blade, something many drug users are very proficient at.
When people not familiar with Tech come on campus and see the signs vandalize, they do not realize that it is a Tech tradition, mainly because it is not, to remove “t” from signs; they believe that we as a campus are unable to properly maintain our signage.
So for those who now feel depressed because they feel as if they no longer have a Tech tradition to hold on to, allow me to suggest a new tradition: showering. While I realize that some people may not care how they look when they go to class, and, honestly, I do not care how most people look either, I do care when people smell as if they have spent the night in a dump.
When someone else’s body-odor begins to affect the learning ability of the people around them, there are serious issues. It shows a complete lack of consideration for one’s fellow student, and a complete lack of civility. So please always remember: people can turn their eyes away; they cannot turn their noses off.
With the semester rapidly coming to an end, projects, tests and homework assignments are beginning to pile up since for some reason it seems that some professors have the time management skills of college students. I guess the line “A lack of planning of your part does not constitute an emergency on mine,” does not apply when former person referred to in the quip assigns the grade of the latter person.
I understand that sometimes things come up, people get sick, flights get delayed, classes get canceled. But it seems for the most part that the faculty at fault one semester for scrambling at the end of the semester are also the faculty at fault the next semester. Is college not supposed to be a learning experience where people learn from their mistakes and adapt to ensure a more advantageous outcome the next time around?
Also, there seems to be a lack of understanding with some of the faculty when it comes to prioritization. If a student has five classes in a semester, chances are good that not all five of those classes hold equal priority for named student. Chances are also good that the elective classes that the student is taking are probably at the bottom of the priority list.
Now, this does not mean that students should say, “I don’t care about this class, just give me an ‘A’.” Students should show up to class and do the work assigned, but professor need not take it so personally when a student seems somewhat disinterested in the material. If the student was overly interested in the subject, that student would most likely be majoring or minoring in that subject. So please, esteemed faculty members, as unnerved as you may be about your apathetic students, take some solace in the fact that most students are equally unnerved to be in your class.
Probably the one group of people at Tech that get to me the most are Architecture majors. We all know: studio is tough; studio is a lot of work; you were up all night working on studio; your studio TA hates you and everything you do. Trust me Architecture majors, we have all heard about your plight with your studio classes, and I do care, but I believe I speak for a large portion of the Tech campus when I say that I do not want to hear about it anymore.
As an Architecture major, I believe you should be able to complain about your studio class for the first couple weeks of your freshman year, after that please leave your comments to your fellow creatures of the night stuck in the buildings between the library and Klaus.
Overall, I understand completely that my complaints about Tech are, at best, minor, if not just petty and irrelevant; I am just fine with that. Besides, if you let the big things that get to you at Tech, chances are pretty good you will go insane. So I say, just stick to thinking about the stupid things; ignorance makes for a happy life.