All Posts Tagged With: "reading week"
The Joy of Reading Week
I would have made this post longer, but, hey, it’s reading week!
One of the more civilized elements of modern university life is reading week.
For those of you unfamiliar with the term, it denotes a week, usually in February, when universities hold no classes. Students have a chance to study for midterms and write their papers, while profs get caught up on grading and look back into that research project neglected since Christmas.
Or you can go on vacation. Or set a new high score on Final Mortal Halo Carjacking VII — or whatever the kids do with their free time these days.
Myself, I’m grading papers and catching up on other tasks. Blogging, for instance. But I have no resentment for those who have toddled off to Cuba or Vancouver or their basements. That’s what’s so grand about reading week. In the darkest, coldest, hardest time of the year comes a week for you to get back on track — however you want.
Embracing your midterms
Less time for studying means more time for relaxation
When I first found out that all my midterms and lab reports were due before Reading Week, I was disappointed that I wouldn’t have the extra studying and report-writing time.
I quickly realized that I was actually lucky.
Had everything been due after Reading Week, I would have spent the entire nine days procrastinating, but not the fun guilt-free kind of procrastination. I’m talking about the type where you know you should be studying, which means you can’t quite bring yourself to do anything fun.
So instead you stare blankly at the TV with your notebook and textbook open in front of you.
I even listen to the infomercials. And not in the normal “I can’t believe anyone would actually buy that thing” way. But in a, “I’d rather watch someone enthusiastically clean their kitchen with a ShamWow cloth than study for my physiology midterm” kind of way.
But heading into Reading Week with my midterms and lab reports behind me, I’m free to spend the whole week reading. Yeah, sure. Reading.
One thing I didn’t do during reading week
It’s like when Frosted Flakes claims to be part of a nutritious breakfast
In public school, that long endless gap between Christmas break and summer vacation is tolerable, thanks to snow days, P.A. days and Easter weekend.
But in university, there are no more snow days.
You’ll never get a Friday off because of a P.A. day.
And Easter weekend isn’t until after the last day of lectures. Yes, it means university students are being robbed. If there isn’t any school missed, it doesn’t officially count as a holiday.
Only March break survived the Public School Holiday Massacre. But first it had to go under the Vacation Protection program. March break got a new name. And, uh, it isn’t in March anymore. Now it’s in the middle of February. And it’s called ‘reading week.’
It’s sort of like when Frosted Flakes claims to be part of a nutritious breakfast. Sure, it might be part of a nutritious breakfast. It’s just not the nutritious part.
Calling it ‘reading week’ just means the old March break got a facelift. An unexpected upgrade. And now we’re all just pretending that we’re, uh, reading.
Right.
