Students’ Views

I can hardly believe that my time at Southwestern is coming to a close. Seeing all the excitement in the faces of the new freshmen this past week has made me feel old. On one hand, it’s wonderful to begin another of school knowing all the expectations of each of my professors, knowing how difficult my work load will be, and feeling some importance in being in a senior. It’s different from the feeling of being a senior in high school, because at this point, my mind is full of ‘what am I going to do next?’ — worrying about if I should apply for law school, apply for graduate school, attempt to get a ‘real’ job, where to live, and deciding all of this all the while still being incredibly invested in current school work, relationships, and life at Southwestern.

Even with feeling a little old, seeing new and old faces back on campus is a very welcomed change. For the summer, I lived in Georgetown and worked in Austin. I lucked into finding a great job with a political consultant, and I spent everyday this summer working in Austin and mostly dealing with transportation lobby issues. I now know more about building large road projects, South Texas politics, transportation re-investment zones, and Capital Metro than I ever thought I would. I spend time organizing fundraisers for state representatives and other elected officials, and I had fancy dinners with Senators, County Commissioners, and other local government members both in Austin and in The Valley. I enjoyed my job so much that I decided to stay on during the school year, and I am still traveling to Austin almost everyday. I’m hoping to work during the legislative session in the spring, and I feel like I’ve learned so much about politics in practice.

Beyond the job, my roommate and I joked that this summer should have been titled ‘Rockbottom/CouchBed/Baby Animal Summer 08′, mainly because we often found ourselves hanging out at the local bar, which is in walking distance from our house and is something we rarely would do when the Southwestern social scene is active. Rockbottom also refers to some of our favorite summer activities: sneeking into a local apartment complex pool to escape the Texas heat, having almost nightly parties — but with the same 10 people since not many students stay in Georgetown all summer, and having our house in a constant state of party clean-up. CouchBed refers to how one of our good friends lived on our couch in the living room for about two months. He did this because he’s living in London for the semester, and needed a place to stay in order to work in Georgetown for the summer. Having someone live on your couch is very fun at first, but never a good idea for a prolonged period of time — an important lesson learned for all involved. Lastly, it was ‘baby animal’ summer because we ended up getting a new kitten. This is was somewhat of an accident, my roommate started dating someone new whose family moved this summer and could not take their kitten. Said kitten looks exactly like Paris, the cat I’ve had for a year now, and they happen to get along well, so we gained another cat mid-summer.

I’m beginning to miss Summer ‘08, especially since this week was the start of classes. This semester I’m taking History of Philosophy: Modern, Environmental Political Thought, Gay & Lesbian Film, Shakespeare through Performance, and Political Science Capstone. The Capstone is my senior research project, which will end with a long paper and presentation to campus. The topic of my Capstone is “The Communist Manifest at 160: Why it Mattered, Does it Matter, Will it Matter?” Basically, I’m doing a whole semester of studying Marx, and will soon have a more direct idea of what aspect I’ll be taking on to address in my research paper. It’s going to be a very difficult semester for me, and right now I’m enjoying the calm before the storm with the first few weeks of class.

More updates on social life, school, and campus events soon!