A minor problem

As a journalism major at BU, I need to have a liberal arts concentration. This is logical. I know it's important to get something out of college other than learn how to write. Most people think that you should learn about whatever you want to write about. This is code for "Maybe you should consider Political Science or International Relations" because clearly all news is about the government or the rest of the world. Well, it isn't.

My favorite part of the newspaper is the Arts and Leisure section but sadly BU doesn't offer classes in concert, CD, food, theater or fashion reviewing. What were they thinking? So I quickly move on to other things that interest me like saving the world. I don't have super powers so I suppose informing people about global injustices would be sufficient. Sadly, courses on global injustices aren't offered either, but there is a class on developing countries. Nevertheless, none of these interests lead me to a minor/concentration.

So I decided I would take some introductory courses in my future minor. Computer Science could be very useful for journalism considering most papers are already on the internet, and the thought of actual newspapers hanging around forever is a bit of a joke. Web journalism is becoming the next print journalism, and everyone has to accept it. So if I was a CS minor with a bachelors is journalism think of all the jobs I would be eligible for. People would love me. Yet, my computer science course is just okay. I find that my professor spends most of her time lecturing on current events in technology instead of the text, which I am totally okay with because I think it's interesting but could be easily achieved by reading the paper. Also, my TA has a hard time speaking English, and seems a little clueless about what exactly he supposed to be teaching us. Could I handle three years of classes like "Concepts of Programming Languages" and "Introduction to Analysis of Algorithms?" I'm not totally sure about that.

I'm really interested in my Anthropology class. It doesn't help that my professor is a really great speaker, so maybe I'll end up with a really horrible teacher next semester and decide I hate anthropology. Despite the masses of reading, I find most of them to be interesting. Still, minoring in anthropology seems very impractical. In fact, I scoff at people who have decided to be anthropology majors. What exactly are they going to do with their degree other than proceed to be in school for another ten years and write a couple of books. I mean I would like to write books, but probably not ethnographic books.

So do I proceed along the path of an anthropology minor or computer science minor? Do I minor in something worthless, but interesting, or something hard that would eventually help me get jobs?

Crapface!

I work with two graduate students, one is in law school and one is in the school of education. Yesterday at work, the one in law school talked about how she wished she had worked in education. She will have a law degree in May, and isn't really sure what she's going to do with it. Both of them said that most of their family works in education, and one embraced it, and one denied it. Both of them spent their summers teaching people in foreign countries in English. Now one is excited about working in foreign countries teaching people theater, and the other regrets that she didn't become a teacher.

I feel as though this is an appropriate time for me to question my life. Am I denying my fate? Perhaps. I am ultra excited at the prospect of teaching English in Ecuador this summer. Let's not forget about how I teach people English on Tuesdays and Thursdays, and work at a preschool on Wednesdays. I want to travel the world, and write about it while I'm at it. Both of them said that teaching English is the best way to travel the globe because a. you're helping people b. you're visiting foreign countries c. you get to know the culture and their traditions and d. people accept you and take you in because you're a good person who likes helping their kiddies. Am I going to be law school girl except I'll have a masters in Journalism, and will know more about teaching people English than writing city news? Ah, questioning my life is my favorite hobby.

Dear editor of the Muse,

We are enemies. Why can't you just recognize that it is my fate to write for the Arts and Entertainment section of the paper at BU? I don't like how you ignore me. I email you three times, and what do I get? A bunch of emails from BU Today but none from you. It's not that I have nothing to write about. I had a suggestion for an article. I just needed your approval that it would actually be printed, but no you couldn't do that. I may not look like a hipster doofus that would normally write for the arts section of a paper, but neither do you. Trust me, I know. I looked you up on facebook. So watch your back cause Comm Ave. is a dangerous place.
your worst nightmare,
Jane Horstmann