Tuesday, August 07, 2012

School

Today was my second day of school. I started fifth semester, which means I'm almost halfway through my bachelor's degree. Actually I'm supposed to be two-thirds done, because the degree is eight semesters long, but you need to take a workshop** during your last four semesters and I didn't join one this semester.

I don't know what I want to specialize in, you see, and the workshop you join will define what you'll write your thesis about and who will be your supervisor. I was completely enamored with Parasitology, which turned out to be a dud when I took the class last semester, so I'm treading carefully in the world of Biology these days.

I'm getting interested in animal behaviour these days. There's a workshop on that but I didn't join it because what if I end up disillusioned with animal behaviour, the way it happened with Parasitology?

I'm taking Ecology of Animal Conduct this semester and so far it's looking great. The teacher is really good, plus he's English so it sounds cool whenever he says a name or book title. The rest of the time he speaks Spanish with an accent reminiscent of my Mom's, so I feel right at home.

Anyway, the animal conduct workshop will open again next year. If I want it, I'll wait for it and add an extra year to my bachelor's degree. If not, I'll join something else next semester.

I also signed up Biological Anthropology because it sounded fascinating, but after going to the first class and getting a list of the recommended bibliography I can see that it's not what I was hoping for (it's mostly genetics), so I'm dropping it like a hot potato so I can concentrate on my other five courses, especially animal behaviour.



** Workshop as in "meeting at which a group of people engage in intensive discussion and activity on a particular subject or project", as defined by the Merriam-Webster dictionary widget I have on my dashboard. We don't spend two years carving table legs or something.

No comments: