Andrea

congrats, ash!

Well the very exciting news around our townhouse (and the campus) is that one of my best friends at St. Mike's was crowned Miss Vermont 2008 this weekend!  Ash competed yesterday at the Barre Opera House and made her first official appearance today at the Vermont Maple Festival in St. Albans.  Three of my roommates and myself drove up today to surprise her. We actually had great timing and met up with her parents shortly before the start of the parade and they brought us over to see her.  She looked beautiful (as always) aboard her horse-drawn carriage.  It was a beautiful day and there were SO many people there - a true spring event in Vermont! 

This afternoon I caught the second half of the baseball double header with one of my roommates.  One of my senior sem partners pitches for St. Mike's so I was glad I could catch part of his game!  Then we all met back at the house and went out for a HUGE dinner to celebrate with Ash tonight.  It was great to all be together and relax .. and for Ash to tell all of her amazing stories of the weekend. 

Everyone around this house is either freaking out because their senior sem / final portfolios are due within the next three days or freaking out because we're packing so our parents can move us out this weekend (before the rush of graduation comes).  Tomorrow begins the last week of classes for the semester ... and for us, forever at St. Mike's.  I have two days of classes left, one weekend left on campus with the underclassmen, one last tour to give ... all those "lasts" that occur in the next three weeks start tomorrow.  Everyone keeps saying it's bittersweet, but to be honest I'm only seeing the "bitter" aspect right now.  When I realized I was giving my last tour tomorrow, it really gave me an opportunity to reflect on the past four years here.  While I've tried to soak up every moment of this semester, it's never been more true than these past four days.  Our new motto is "take pictures of everything."  Whether you end up at SMC (I hope!) or a college that better suits your interests, I can promise you it will go by FAR too fast.  Either way, I can only hope when you get to the point we're at that you can look back on those four years with the  best of memories with the best of friends...

today's the day

So I think I'm suppose to be nervous right now, but I'm not.  We're presenting our Senior Seminar project this afternoon at 2:30ish - the last of 14 groups to go (we still haven't figured out if this is good or bad).  We met last night as a group to go over what each person is saying, made some last minute corrections to the Web site and watched the videos through.  I know we'll be fine, though - between writing the paper since November and conducting interviews since January, we know it "like the back of our hands."  Everyone who has gone has had the same feeling. I'm most excited to see Bill + Mark's presentation - they did a movie on the life and studies of cryptozoologists (no better place than Vermont with the "Champ" discussion).  The parts of the movie we've seen so far have been amazing.  And they've been working since we 'passed in' our projects on fine tuning everything.  This shows what a range of topics were in our class this year - everything from Lake Monsters to Brittney Spears to Cambodian Refugees.  It really is a great opportunity to explore something you have a passion about.

As I look outside my window right now you can see the trees are starting to bud and leaves are coming out.  We've all said it, but it's been three gorgeous weeks of weather here and campus is starting to get all fixed up and the plowers replanted (another reason it's my favorite time of year here - this place is picturesque during the fall and spring).  There's no better time than to visit now!

Yesterday we had our last Founders Society coordinator / adviser meeting.  We went over Sunday night's allocation meeting, Friday's event, and concerns everyone had.  Drew joined us to talk about the E-Team he is forming with Carrie next year (read their blogs) - after doing my technology internship this past summer I think it's going to be a huge success.  We also decided on our two new coordinators who will be replacing me and Mal next year (Josh and Nick will be staying around) - they'll be  introduced at Friday's dinner, as well - and they'll both be great! 

Outside classes? Another reason I love SMC.

Despite the fact the temperatures got to nearly 80 degrees today, I'm pretty sure most of campus was watching the Bruins' game tonight (and unfortunate loss).  I'm getting worried that the sun is going to stop shining soon because we've literally had the most gorgeous two and a half weeks there.  And there's no place like St. Mike's in the spring - perhaps my favorite part is you're never too old to have class outside.  Professors are always taking their classes out to the quad or the teaching gardens when the weather gets nice (and it's most appreciated).  Students also venture outside to enjoy the "fun" side of the warm weather - intramural co-ed softball (a SMC favorite) is in full swing.  My friends who live in the 300 townhouse areas are now claiming their front yard as a "beach" despite the fact the single patch of snow from the jib fest earlier this winter is still there.  This past weekend my roommates and I certainly took advantage of one our last weekends here - we spent time together, watched our friendly Ashley in the annual SMC talent show in McCarthy, visited with our friends, gave tours for the last Accepted Student Open House, relaxed in our backyard, had a fire pit with our neighbors, ran by Lake Champlain (there's a great bike/running path that goes by the waterfront) and ate dinner all together with our two other very close friends downtown on Sunday night to end the weekend. It was an amazing weekend with great friends.

The countdown of the "lasts" has definitely begun.  I just finished my last college paper ever!  On Wednesday we (finally) present our Senior Sem and with the possibility of only one more exam in my Media and Iraq class, even the assignments are over.  It'll be nice to relax and enjoy the gorgeous weather and last few weeks, but part of me wishes I had lots to do so I wasn't thinking about it.

On Friday we have our last Founders Society event of the year - our annual end-of-year party.  It  has a theme each year.  Last year we did "Fun in the Sun" which worked out nicely because we had a GORGEOUS spring day.  This year we've decided on "Dress to Impress:  Purple and Gold" to stick with the St. Mike's colors.  We'll have a nice dinner and then the coordinators and advisors will honor members who have worked particularly hard throughout the year and our seniors.  It's always a fun time and a great way to end the year.  Today I gave two tours - admissions is in the middle of a busy "season" as seniors must make their decision by May 1 and juniors are starting to look at the school (it's never too early to start!).  This morning I gave a tour to a group of juniors and their parents and this afternoon my tour group was made up with college counselors from various high schools and and independent schools around the country.  They are here on a week-long bus tour to look at the Vermont colleges and bring the information back to their students (I had one counselor as far away as Texas).  They had lots of great questions and seemed genuinely interested in my experiences here! 

RA "Educationals"

First off, our Residence Life staff does a great job of putting events on throughout the campus seven days a week.  Last night Kate, one the ACA's in the 100 Townhouse Areas.  Each semester, the ACAs are required to put on an education.  Last night, Kate invited Dan Couture, a representative from Financial Aid, to come speak with us.  And he was great - very informative but provided humor into a situation where it was needed.  Participants ranged from people who didn't even know they had financial aid to people who already had their post-graduation budget planned.  He explained terms, consolidating ideas, deferring from grad school.  It definitely lived up to it's name of "educational," but like I said we were all able to share some laughs over the whole loan repayment process.

It literally had been gorgeous here since last Saturday.  The sun has been shining every day and everyone's pulled out the summer clothes (you'll quickly learn that 50 degrees is like a heat wave in Vermont).  Frisbee practice has started in the quad already.  And while it looks like a rainy weekend, they said that last Saturday, too.  So let's keep our fingers crossed for at least some blue skies!

I was suppose to go home for an appointment tomorrow, but it's canceled.  While most of my roommates are off-campus for the weekend (an extremely rare occasion in our apartment), I've just decided to stay here, catch up on some sleep ... and write my LAST paper.  It's a 10-page paper for my Media and Iraq class, and I'm writing it on the comparison between the coverage of athletically-related servicemen and those who do not necessarily have athletic affiliations.  I have a passion for sports, so I'm actually really looking forward to writing it.  Scary, however, to think it may be the last paper I ever write!   

While I just realized that three weeks from today will be my last college classes ever, I'm beginning to be okay with it.  I've finally accepted that fact that I am not, in fact, returning to St. Mike's next year.  I'm still looking for different jobs and deciding if I will accept my offer to grad school.  It's all going to work out.  And the day after graduation all of my roommates and three of our other friends are leaving for Florida on vacation for a week.  Just another way to delay this so called "real world" a little longer ...   

It's done!

I think I'll probably be smiling in my sleep tonight.  The reason I've been MIA for a while is because of Senior Seminar.  For journalism students, this entails an approximately 20 page paper that is written on your paper topic during the first semester and then culminates with a media-related project second semester.  For my group, our topic was the effects of youth sports specialization and our project was a Web site with embedded video.  After having four tapes chewed in the capture deck, we were finally back on track with a week to go.  However, last Tuesday night a file of a video we had made somehow went missing and the backup file wouldn't open ... needless to say there were many late night (and early mornings) spent working on the journalism labs.  Our professor was nice enough to give us an extension until today because of all our technological-related problems.  And we're finished!  After sitting in the lab all day Sunday (it was sunny, 60 degrees and not a cloud in the sky ... torture), we put the finishing touches on our site this morning and uploaded it to the Internet.  SO this means you can check it out!  Our project is called "Keeping Up With The Jones': The Impact of Youth Sports Specialization" and can be viewed at www.youthsportsspecializaton.com !  Make sure you sound is on to hear the videos.

It's so weird to think that this is the last "big" project I'll have as a college student.  My only really big thing left is a 10-page paper for my Media & Iraq class (I'm doing it on the media coverage of athletes in war), and it'll basically be graduation time for me - scary!   So much of my academic time at St. Michael's has been involving journalism - from my internship to classes to summer work.  It's involved MANY late nights in the lab and computer issues and multimedia projects.  And as much as we've all complained our way through it, we decided the other morning in the lab that we would do it all over again.  One of my roommates remarked how journalism allowed me to have "academic memories."  I guess it's true ... people in this major do have the opportunity to get close.  And there is time for "fun" in the lab. 

This weekend was the Wyclef concert at St. Mike's.  And it was an AMAZING show.  It was definitely the best concert that we've had in the four years I've been here (and I've heard from many people the best in a while).  They ended up selling out the show which is great for the school - and a testament to all the hard work put in by the Student Association.  On Saturday we all had to wake up early for the Accepted Student Open House (if you didn't make this one, there's still time to sign up for the one on April 19th).  The rain even held off for the morning tours, and I think it ended up being a great day for everyone involved.  Saturday afternoon ended up turning out beautiful - one of those days on campus when everyone brings their work/fun/chairs outside to enjoy the weather.  There really is nothing better than spring at SMC ... and this week looks to really kick it off!