The month of January is marked by the first-year students of the liberal education program declaring their Major and Minor. The month before that is marked by them scrambling around to find their peer mentors with questions about majors and possible minors, frequenting their faculty mentors’ office to seek advice, and each other to share the confusion. This is why December usually had presentations by all the departments to talk about the programs they offer and it’s details, spread over a whole day. However, students usually dozed off halfway through these, or sneaked off for a few presentations.
This year, we did away with the presentation and had a fair. This meant that students could come and go as they pleased and could stay for any duration of time between 2 – 5 pm. Every department exhibited the best research their students had undertaken, career prospects, courses involved, candy, and some puns. The faculty were engaged in a friendly competition to get more students to their table and put in their best. The EVS department made an eco-friendly basket with post-its on it, a psychology professor with an affinity for puns drew a brain titled “It’s the ‘in’ thing’!”, the Public Policy department were giving out beautiful pamphlets, and the Literary and Culture Studies department chose the most fool-proof way – they were giving out candy. This fair was a chance for the first-year students to interact with multiple faculty and the senior students who had already chosen the major or minor. As with all academic fairs, there was tea and snacks and most eyes were glued to the door by 3 pm. Once the awaited tea had arrived, faculty and students intermingled, talking about courses, books, food, and life. It wrapped up around 5 pm and the faculty as well as students heaved a sigh of relief as they would no longer have to hold the students captive in the day long presentations.
By Sharvari Karandikar
Third year undergraduate student.