I'm Ranting. Are You Listening?

Wow I am ready to rant.  Sometimes I wish I could just record my rant and play a recording of it because I feel like I lose some of the ranting-ness when I type.  Regardless, I'm giving it a go.

So, what will I rant about today?  I'm expressing my strong feelings about the ungratefulness and/ or stupidity and/ or immaturity of some BYU-Idaho students.  Sometimes I honestly want to smack people upside the head!!!

I don't understand what people could POSSIBLY complain about regarding BYUI.  Okay, I can see how some people wish we had intercollegiate sports...but that's about it.

Here's what's happening at BYUI.  You are coming to an LDS school and paying $1825 for a semester (starting Fall 2013...it's a little cheaper right now).  A SEMESTER.  That's $152 per credit.  ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTY TWO dollars per credit.  Wanna know what you should be paying for a BYU-Idaho education?  Closer to $10,000- $12,000 (one of my professors estimates it's even more then that) a semester.  You are getting your education at an 80% discount.

What are you getting for that $1825?  You get classes with an average of 30 students.  You get professors who know your name, care about your life and want you to succeed.  You get professors who have worked in the real world and who are at the top of their game. You get a fitness center built in 2011 with brand new equipment worth about a million dollars...for free.  You get an amazing gym you can use at your discretion.  Racquetball/ Wallball courts, a pool, and even more gyms.  You get a 15,000 seat top-of-the-line, award winning auditorium.  In the auditorium you get spiritual fulfillment every week from some of the greatest leaders of the church today.  You get hands-on experience in every.single.major.  There's a cadaver lab (with four bodies), 16,000 sq feet of greenhouses and hundreds of thousands of feet of outdoor gardens, an automotive body shop, a welding lab, a woodworking shop, a photography lab, art labs, a state-of-the-art industrial kitchen and bakery, sewing labs, a preschool lab where you actually work with children, an off-site livestock center with all sorts of large animals and animal labs, ballrooms upon ballrooms, newsrooms, broadcasting studios, a geology and wildlife museum, chemistry and physics labs....should I go on?!

Student services.  You have free tutoring for practically any class you could want.  Besides one-on-one tutoring there are accounting, physics, chemistry, economics, math, writing, and foreign language open tutoring centers. Free fitness consultants at the gym.  Free fitness workshops every night including Zumba, yoga, pilates, cycling, abs that rock, water aerobics, Latin Jam, step classes and more.  Free nutrition counseling and full-body assessments at the Wellness Center.  Free any-kind-of counseling by licensed professionals at the counseling center.  A free computer help desk to assist with any laptop/ computer problems you may encounter and 24 hour phone service to assist you if you are at home.  $1 Ballroom, Latin, Country and Swing dances every week with and extra hour of instruction included.  Dirt cheap performances by entertainers from around the country.  Bill Cosby, The PianoGuys, The Chinese Acrobats, Diamond Rio, Jim Brickman, Chris Mann to name a few.

And what do students do?  They COMPLAIN.  They complain because they have to be home by midnight.  They complain because they can't wear shorts and flip-flops on campus.  They complain because they have to go to church and fhe.  They complain because they have homework.  They complain because their roommates are goody-two-shoes.  They complain because they have the wrong track.  They complain because they can't come on their off-track.  They complain because they can't get into a class.  They complain because they didn't get a scholarship.  They complain because there's too much group work.  They complain because they have to go to school through July when their friends were done months ago.  They complain because Rexburg is small.  They complain because there's "nothing to do here."  They complain that the university is stealing their agency.  They complain that the library isn't open later.  They complain that the food on campus is too expensive.  They complain it's too cold/ windy.  They complain and complain and complain. 

I'm sick of it.  I'm sooooooo done and over it. 

I talk to people on a weekly basis who are practically begging me to help them get into BYU-Idaho.  Who would give almost ANYTHING to be here and can't for some reason or another (don't meet requirements, miss deadlines etc).  It breaks my heart when I know that there are so many people who don't have the opportunity to come here and then there are hundreds here who take every last bit of it for granted. 

Yesterday, I was talking with a friend who went on a date with a guy who turned out to be a real jerk.  And that's putting it lightly.  He had no respect for her or for women in general and it made me sick hearing what he tried doing to her.  I won't lie.  I want him gone.  I want him to leave and never come back.  I want him to withdraw from his classes two weeks before finals and I don't want a single thing he did to count this semester.  He doesn't deserve to be here.  I am FURIOUS!  And I have no problem saying it.

Great things come from sacrifices.  And if I have to sacrifice wearing shorts to class to go to a university with everything listed above, then it's a no-brainer.  And I'm not going to complain.  I'm going to be grateful that's the only sacrifice I'm making.  Actually, it's not the only sacrifice.  I'm a fall/ spring student.  So I don't go to school January- April.  Weird, I know.  But because of this system, BYU-Idaho can admit approximately 6,000 more students per year.  When people come into the office to complain about their track, sometimes I want to tell them that based on their application, they probably wouldn't have even gotten into BYUI without the track system.  And I'm sorry, you may have to grow up sooner than expected and find a job out here instead of going home every summer to work at Dairy Queen.  Trust me, I know you can find a different job...you just haven't looked yet.  Welcome to the real world where things don't always go as planned and sometimes you have to make decisions you didn't think you would have to make.  Do you want to come to BYUI or do you want to sell pest-control in the summer.  Yes, I understand you make a lot of money doing that.  That's fantastic!  I wish I could make $30,000 in three months without a college degree.  If I could do that, I'd probably drop out of college and just do that full-time!  So what do you want?  Do you want to come to BYU-Idaho?  Because maybe you're going to have to make a sacrifice to do so.

If you don't want to come here then don't.  There are thousands of other universities you can go to that let you wear shorts and flip-flops to campus and let you say out as long as you want every night.  No one is checking up on you.  No one cares if you go to church.  No ones cares if you pass your classes.  No ones cares what your name is or what you want to do with your life.

Maybe that's a slight exaggeration on some points.  I will admit, I'm sure it is.  But not on every point.

Think about it.  Think about why you want to be here and what a privilege it is to be here.  Think about how many people here are rooting for you to succeed in life!  Think about how many people around the world wish they were in your place.  Think about how much extra sleep you get because you're home by midnight everynight ;)

I know I'm preaching to the choir.  I doubt anyone that reads this (if you've actually read this whole thing you are my new favorite person) that hates BYUI and is now going to change their outlook on it.  But I had to get it out.  Thanks for listening to my rant.  More might be coming soon.

The Current Bane of My Existence

Bane: a person or thing that ruins or spoils.

Group projects.  Don't they ruin everything?

Allow me to vent for a moment.  Just a moment, and then I'll stop.  This might be a lengthy moment, but if it were short, I'd actually have to start working on homework soon.

Soooooooooo...I have this group project.  It started the first week of the semester.  Basically, this group project is the entire class.  In a nutshell, we have to design a health promotion program.  This includes assessing our target population to make sure there's a need for a program, finding more data and research to back up the need, creating a program, putting together a marketing plan, a budget, goals and objectives, etc.  The only thing we don't do is actually implement the program. 

As I said, we've been working on it since week one.  The way the class is designed though makes it so that you feel like you're right on track for the first month and a half and then the last three weeks are just crazy.  The project is due on Monday and it definitely is CRAZY.  Especially when you're in a group of four people and only two of you are doing most of the work.  And now we're to the point where I don't even want the other girls to do anything because they have no idea what's going on AND the assignments they've had so far have either a) not gotten done in a timely manner or b) been done halfway or are just plain sloppy.  Uggg.  I'm so grateful at least one other person in my group is putting time into this!!

Here are my biggest issues with the two weak links (rude, but true).  

1) Most of our classes are "lab days" which just means that you have that time to work in your groups.  There have been other days though that are lecture where the professor explains how part of a project needs to be done.  The two rarely come to those lecture days which leaves the other girl and I to take notes, understand what's going on, and then take our group time trying to explain it to the ones who were missing.  This would be another reason their work isn't any good, they weren't in class to see what he wants!  What's worse is that I'll talk to them the day before and they'll say "see you tomorrow!" which would lead me to assume that they mean they'll be in class the next day since I've never just seen them around randomly.  But apparently, there's some hidden meaning in this phrase because they don't come to class and I don't "see them tomorrow."

2) They never volunteer to do anything.  Arielle and I will start saying "oh, I'll do that" or "I've already got that started so I'll just finish it" or "I already did that" and they'll just sit there....waiting for us to tell them what to do.  Both of us have just done things so that they'll be done and neither of them have put forth any effort to do something unless it was asked of them.  And we've both redone their stuff a few times because it wasn't professional or complete (one girl told me today she'd make sure her part looked cute.  I said "no, we need it to look professional.  You need to put it in Cambria font, size 12 like the rest of the project).  Today, we went to the professor to ask him some questions and get feedback on what we have done and they just sat in their desks, checking their phones, not really caring I guess.  

3) How do they think this stuff is getting done?!  Are they totally oblivious to the fact that some of the things we've done have taken HOURS to put together.  I've contacted multiple people to set up interviews, taken time to prepare questions and go interview them and spent hours creating marketing posters, a curriculum, calendar and more.  The other girl has typed up PAGES of interventions, goals and objectives as well as put in way too much time doing research for it because the others never did research to give to her. 

I could go on.  

I actually really like this project.  It reminds me of when my siblings and I would play "work" when we were younger.  It could be a fun class and I love our project and what we're doing.  I just wish I only had to do a quarter of it and not half.  If it was my only class, I probably wouldn't mind.  But seeing as I have three other classes, I can't really put all my time into this one.  I know the other girls are busy but WELCOME TO COLLEGE AND SUCK IT UP.  You signed up for this.  Don't think you're any busier than the others.  We all have jobs, we all have classes, we all have social lives and we all have this project that needs to be turned in by 4:00 Monday afternoon.  

Come 4:00, I will be one happy camper.