Uni Rant #1

Is this number one? I don't know, I don't think I've ever ranted about college before. Have I? Maybe. I have in my head, anyway. If you don't read this, I won't blame you. Seriously.

I've been rather quiet about uni lately because I have no idea what's going on. Today, though, the line between me attending the university I'm currently in and me dropping out become increasingly blurred.

I transferred to this college last fall, so this May I will have been there for an entire school year. At first it was my choice to transfer, but by May I knew it needed to be done no matter what--it was a third of the price of my other college, and I needed to be home to be with my mom during her whole bout with breast cancer. I feel as though, now, that just taking this entire last year off would have been more beneficial to me.

I have had problems with this college since before classes even started last fall. My first issue was not having an advisor, so they randomly set me up with the English department chair. This was actually really good, and he was ever so helpful. He signed me up with an actual advisor, who we'll call Mr. 30 Minute. Mr. 30 Minute has office hours from 12:00-12:30pm on Wednesdays. That's it. The end. Mr. 30 Minute does say he'll schedule you separate office hours, however...that's only if you can get a hold of Mr. 30 Minute. I have spoken with Mr. 30 Minute once, and he got back to me on a Thursday night when I needed to see him Friday at noon (and I skipped a class for it), and our conversation was basically:

Mr. 30M: "Do you have any questions?"
Me: "What about taking blah blah blah or blah blah blah with blah blah blah."
Mr. 30M: "...um, you'll have to ask the Education Department"
rinse, lather, repeat....multiple times.

So then I call the Education department, and their words are: "You'll have to ask the English department." So I eventually just made up my own mind about my questions and decided that's how it would be. The problem is that they have advisors for English and advisors for Education, but not advisors for English Education majors--and the English Ed. majors curriculum is a mixture of the two and no one has any idea what's going on. Since then I've tried like hell to get a hold of Mr. 30 Minute, and have heard nothing. I asked about placement tests, which he failed to mention during our conversation about being in repeat classes, and heard nothing. Not that I actually think it would help, because he obviously has no idea what he's doing. Or what I'm supposed to be doing. Well, friend...that makes two of us. I would just go back to the chair, except he died a couple months ago. And when I called in to ask a question, they said "You'll have to talk to your department chair" ...why is it that I had to remind them that the guy died two weeks before that? I don't know.

I have to retake a ton of classes...speech, computer, phys ed, even some classes that have the exact same class name I have to retake. I find it ridiculous and stupid. No one else cares, however, so I'm stuck in this. (Also, I have to take a foreign language as a requirement of the English department. No, it's not gen. ed. and it's not an Education requirement. It's a requirement of the English department to take a foreign language....dare I say, wtf?)

Monday I find out that the English department is changing the entire curriculum. Welcome to pointless, GPA dropping Shakespeare I. It's apparently already passed, but they haven't felt the need to tell the majors about it yet. They haven't "figured out what to do about the current majors," I'm told.

I also spent hours trying to make my schedule for next semester on Monday. I am required to take a certain set of education classes at a certain time. 4 classes this Fall, three are 2 credits and one is 1 credit. Total is 7. Full-time is 12. This would be fine and dandy and easy to combat, except that each one of these classes takes up more time every week than a normal 3 credit course. (I think this is where the term FML is appropriate). So I had to schedule 7 classes, two of which were web classes because I don't have time to go while I'm working. One isn't even on campus.

Well, I go to register for classes tonight, and only 2 of the 7 go through. 3/4 education classes scream YOU HAD TO TAKE EDU104 FIRST TO TAKE THIS and I'm like...I'm sorry, WHAT?! No where on my curriculum sheets is that class listed. No where. I poked around, and finally just signed up for the damn 104 class over the summer, except now I still can't register for the others because that's not cleared on my transcript. Plus that's an extra $500 I have to find somewhere for a stupid 1 credit course. If I can't register for those, that will push me back an entire year. However, one of the web classes I chose is restricted to freakin' theatre majors (isn't it enough that they invade my art classes???) and I can't sign up for Spanish 201 because I haven't taken 101/102. This is supposed to be an automatic pass because I took it in high school. Not that I know anything, just that I took it. Tomorrow morning there will be hell raised.

The options (other than staying here, at Devil University):
-I put in an application for readmission at my old college on my birthday in December. I called them earlier this week after the English curriculum debacle to check on my financial aid package. They said they are trying to send them all out by the end of the week. Fair enough. But I can't make a decision without the aid package. It's seriously pricey, and I don't have the kind of money to spend on it that I did before, nor the grades that got me the scholarships I had before. The woman said it looked like I qualified for grants, but grants usually come with a clause that if you take it, you work in the state for two years so that it's waived. I can't do that. We'll be gone.
-Take a year ....erm...sabbatical, and move the wedding up a year. Right now, we're planning on June 2011. If we did this, it would be June 2010, and then I'd move with B wherever he is stationed, and reenter school there using the GI bill. I'd be basically the same place I am now, anyway.

I don't know. I'm just thoroughly annoyed with this right now and have hit the bullshit quotient with Devil University.

And I ripped the knee of my jeans today.