University is fun!
Or at least, more so then high school. It's also what I've been doing for the last three months (and part of the reason why I haven't blogged since.) I'm currently in my first year at UBC studying Engineering. Oddly enough, I've found that I'm more social as well now that I'm at university. (Another reason for no blogging, since I'm hardly ever on the computer.)
So far it's been good. I've met lots of new and interesting people, gotten better at playing bridge, and I don't find the work as hard as I'd thought it would be. (Although I'm sure I'll be kicking myself for this comment later.) So far I've done better then I've anticipated on all my midterms, which allows me to relax a bit for the next couple weeks until finals come.
I've also joined the UBC Rocket Project team, which has been really interesting so far. I do feel they are a bit optimistic about the launch date, what with nothing much being built yet, and very little money available, but it'll be interesting to see how much happens. But we had a 4 hour meeting this morning that has instilled a bit more confidence in me.
That's all for now. |
Take 2 trays ice cubes (freshly made is recommended, since they can taste funny if left in the freezer for a few months), put in blender. Blend (preferably using an auto-crush feature) until finely crushed. Add 1 can of frozen concentrated lemonade, and process until smooth.
Not recommended to be all consumed in one sitting, but my is it delicious. |
Probably the only people who will ever read this have already heard this from me, but here it is anyways...
From Thursday afternoon to this afternoon, I was on a band trip with school to the Sun Peaks Music Festival. Overall it was a fairly good trip, but there were a few 'incidents' which caused some problems and have resulted in many students having lowered opinions of the teachers concerned. I'm not going to use real names, because I don't want to run the risk of making people mad, so I will just refer to people as "band teacher #1" and so forth....
Thursday Afternoon - Getting to Sun Peaks
We left school at 4:00 PM on Thursday afternoon. Crammed into two tour busses (60 students or so) for more then 5 hours before finally arriving at our (quite nice) hotel. By that time it was somewhere around 11:00 PM, due to a couple incidents involving bus drivers who have less directional sense then a rock. Bus #1 (which I was on) arrived first but we were still about 45 minutes later then we should've been, due to the bus driver somehow missing the giant sign on the highway saying "Sun Peaks Ski Resort ->" and going the wrong way. He finally listened to the chaperones and turned around, but it meant we had to backtrack for almost an hour. Bus #2 never made it to the rendezvous we were supposed to have at dinner time. From some short cell calls to students on that bus, we determined that they had somehow gotten a bit lost. Apparently they stopped somewhere else for dinner, but it meant we weren't able to switch movies with them. Other then that, the bus ride was uneventful and we all did manage to arrive safe and sound at the hotel.
We then checked into our hotel rooms, which were very nice hotel rooms. Hauling things up the elevators was a bit of a mess, since one of the three elevators seemed permanently stuck at the Lower Lobby level, and the ones that did move moved incredibly slowly. (One trip took nearly 5 minutes to go from the third floor to the Lobby. Seriously. We didn't even feel the elevator moving, thats how slow it went.) I was rooming with a student, and one of the chaperones, who was actually a student who graduated last year and was much more like a student then a chaperone. (In a good way) Besides this chaperone, there were two parents along, the band student teacher, our two band teachers, the choir teacher and one of the science teachers who just wanted to come along for the trip. (This will all come into play later.)
Friday - Things start to go downhill
Friday began with a nice chunk of free time. We were allowed to sleep in pretty much as long as we liked, with our first scheduled event at 1:15. After a delicious breakfast at a cafe nearby, we headed down to the choir performance. The rest of the afternoon went pretty much according to plan, until that evening. We had more free time that evening, and by that time rumours had been circulating through the students that some people had brought alcohol along. (One of those things you're really not supposed to be doing on a school trip, along with illicit substances (which we'll get to later)). At some point that afternoon the teachers learned of these rumours. They began casually searching rooms, and it wasn't long before they encountered people who had an identifiable smell on their breaths. The remaining cans of beer and the unopened bottle of rum were confiscated by the teachers and the principal of the school was contacted. The teachers were very angry (and disappointed) that students had been drinking on the trip, and the principal agreed that they should be sent home immediately at the students' expense. They were sent to pack, and a shuttle bus was called to take them from the hotel to the greyhound depot in the nearest town. The shuttle arrived, and the students were about to be sent off when a call was received from the superintendent. Apparently it wasn't considered safe to be sending two students home by themselves on a bus. A chaperone couldn't go with them because then there would be too few chaperones left for the number of students. The end result was that the students were permitted to stay. No official statement was made by any of the teachers, and the main rumour floating around was that the teachers had been just scaring the students by threatening to send them home. (Something we all thought was cruel and bad form.) We learned later about what the superintendent had said.
It was then learned that the teachers (except for band teacher #2 and the student teacher) had 'disposed' of the confiscated alcohol that evening. They drank it all, along with the chaperones (with the exception of the chaperone/graduated-student). Needless to say, none of us were very impressed. The main reasoning the teachers had used for being mad at the students was that this was a school situation. So... Since when can teachers drink at school? That's news to me.
Saturday
The big performances go off without a hitch. There still has been no information given by the teachers about the things that have been happening. Multiple rumours are going around, and nobody really knows what is happening. That evening, a student learns that other students have been smoking pot on the trip. The student contacts the teachers, since they feel it's best to get it out in the open. The response the student got from the choir teacher went like this: "Hmm... Try and find him, and let him know we'll be doing a search of his room tonight. If the pot is gone, then we won't have to worry about anything."
This went completely against the earlier treatment of the students caught drinking. Many people considered this to be a completely unfair treatment, especially considering that the drugs in question here are illegal. Band teacher #1 and the Choir teacher also asked the chaperone/graduated-student to keep tabs on the students, basically to try to spy on them and glean information from them. This really put him in an uncomfortable position, and was not a nice thing to do. He was really quite angry with the teachers and eventually had a talk with Band teacher #2 about what had been going on. When she heard about this, she was quite upset with the way Band teacher #1 and the Choir teacher were acting. I also talked with them about the lack of any official information on anything that had been happening, and later that evening we had a group meeting, where they finally explained some of the things that had been going on.
Many of us students have really lost a lot of respect for the teachers involved in this because of their double standards. They seem to make the rules up however it suits them best at the time, instead of following the actual school rules. And the really irritating thing is that the students who were caught drinking will now be suspended (bad time to do so, since AP exams are coming up), yet the teachers will get off scot free when they have done the same thing. I'd say what they did was worse, because they're supposed to be the responsible adults on the trip.
What an example to set... |
It could hardly be school without group projects, could it?
Let me just say it straight out. I loathe group projects. I can count the number of times they've gone well for me on both hands, whereas the number of times I've encountered failure would take more appendages then I possess. It never fails that my partner will end up managing to either bungle their part completely, or just not get it done at all. The worst part is when the teacher FORCES you to have a partner on a project where you supposedly have the choice to do it alone.
So here I am writing this after being kept up an hour later then I wanted to be (because of a group project, surprise surprise) only to find out that my partner will NOT have the information ready tonight (surprise surprise there too) for the project due tomorrow. I think I'll just go to bed now (colds have a wonderful way of wanting to make you sleep early) and hand in my part tomorrow. I'll let my partner explain why her part is not ready, while I eye my teacher with the "I told you I wanted to work alone, so there's no bloody way this is my fault." look.
With luck I won't lose too many marks (or lose my restraint and cause bodily harm to my project partner). |
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People
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Apr. 11th, 2005 @ 05:10 pm
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Sometimes people just make me mad. It really annoys me when people just refuse to acknowledge any point of view other then their own. How are you supposed to be able to discuss anything, or come to any sort of agreement when the other person won't listen to you?
Some days it's tempting just to whack some sense into them. |
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