Finally, the weekend!
Well it is the weekend at last. It's so great to have a break from class and just be able to get work done at your leisure. Although I am inclined to be more leisurely than is appropriate at this time; I'm really tired today from dancing at the Umphrey's McGee show last night.
The show was pretty fun. Definitely not one of the best UM shows I've seen (I think this was #12 or 13) but very enjoyable. There were only 200 people there, a far cry from the packed shows I've seen in the past year and a half. The venue was really lame, though. No smoking, no drinking, no nothing. Which is totally wack because it was just a huge metal warehouse with adequate air circulation. It was way too big for the 200 people who showed up-- I'll bet this place could hold 1500 people or more-- but this was nice because there was room to groove. Pinksy, Evan, Chris Martin and I were in the front row the whole time. Bassist Ryan "Pony" Stasik sang for only the fourth time in UM history, on Biz Markie's "Just a Friend." We chilled with the band after the show and I tried to get Bayliss to sign a copy of Local Band Does OK, but the only pen I could find didn't work very well. Bummer.
So now this weekend is to be dedicated to: 1)TORTS (midterm is in a week and a half), 2)PROPERTY (I really need to "get" estates in land and future interests) and 3) everything else that might need to be read, etc. Blah. It's hard to focus on school because Tulane is seriously screwing with our heads and providing terrible leadership. A message was posted from the associate dean of the law school on Tuesday that any student who is visiting away this semester will be required to return to Tulane in the spring, or withdraw from school. No one will be allowed to visit in the spring. This makes NO SENSE and it makes me sick that my school is looking out for their OWN bottom line while disregarding the financial situations of its students, in addition to disregarding the WELL-BEING of its students. Where are we supposed to live? Most of us have lost everything and apartments are mold-infested and uninhabitable. Many people have signed leases in new cities and relocated their families. Furthermore, the 1L class will be a logistical nightmare. My guess is that about 25-25% of students visited other schools; the rest are waiting for Tulane to tell them what to do, deferred for a year, or withdrew. So the majority of the 1L class will have to do some sort of accelerated program to get them finished with two semesters' worth of class by the end of the summer (!), while those of us who visited will probably have to do this too because curricula at different schools are not standardized. We will all have to go to class 6-8 hours a day, 6 days a week to do this, and the people who didn't visit this semester will resent those of us who did and think that we have an "edge" (which we probably would). I seriously doubt that Tulane will be in position to offer all the classes everyone individually needs to avoid this situation. Hell, I seriously doubt Tulane's contention that it will be operational (and New Orleans will be habitable) in the spring! This line of thinking is purely delusional and money-driven! It's really ironic that they dropped this bomb on us that we had to come back, with the rider that they are trying to get together a plan to inform us of HOW they're going to start classes in January, but they can't work on it because they are evacuating Houston because of ANOTHER HURRICANE! Basically they are really sticking it to the current law students: "Yeah, we know you're unhappy with the way we're dealing with this, but we don't care because the school needs to remain solvent." Why should students care about Tulane when Tulane doesn't care about them?
So this situation is really frustrating. University of Richmond has not yet informed the visiting students of what its policy regarding this development will be. I really hope that I am able to stay here indefinitely; if not, it might be time to re-evaluate law school, or at least postpone it again for a few years, because I would rather NOT be in school than BE in school in New Orleans. I'm never living there again. Will not. Can not. Go back. The health risks, the likelihood of many more evacuations and possible devastations in the next two years alone...not happening.
Sorry to end this post with all this negativity, I've been letting it simmer for a few days now and I am really upset about the whole thing. So I'll just get back to reading Civil Procedure and let it go for now...
The show was pretty fun. Definitely not one of the best UM shows I've seen (I think this was #12 or 13) but very enjoyable. There were only 200 people there, a far cry from the packed shows I've seen in the past year and a half. The venue was really lame, though. No smoking, no drinking, no nothing. Which is totally wack because it was just a huge metal warehouse with adequate air circulation. It was way too big for the 200 people who showed up-- I'll bet this place could hold 1500 people or more-- but this was nice because there was room to groove. Pinksy, Evan, Chris Martin and I were in the front row the whole time. Bassist Ryan "Pony" Stasik sang for only the fourth time in UM history, on Biz Markie's "Just a Friend." We chilled with the band after the show and I tried to get Bayliss to sign a copy of Local Band Does OK, but the only pen I could find didn't work very well. Bummer.
So now this weekend is to be dedicated to: 1)TORTS (midterm is in a week and a half), 2)PROPERTY (I really need to "get" estates in land and future interests) and 3) everything else that might need to be read, etc. Blah. It's hard to focus on school because Tulane is seriously screwing with our heads and providing terrible leadership. A message was posted from the associate dean of the law school on Tuesday that any student who is visiting away this semester will be required to return to Tulane in the spring, or withdraw from school. No one will be allowed to visit in the spring. This makes NO SENSE and it makes me sick that my school is looking out for their OWN bottom line while disregarding the financial situations of its students, in addition to disregarding the WELL-BEING of its students. Where are we supposed to live? Most of us have lost everything and apartments are mold-infested and uninhabitable. Many people have signed leases in new cities and relocated their families. Furthermore, the 1L class will be a logistical nightmare. My guess is that about 25-25% of students visited other schools; the rest are waiting for Tulane to tell them what to do, deferred for a year, or withdrew. So the majority of the 1L class will have to do some sort of accelerated program to get them finished with two semesters' worth of class by the end of the summer (!), while those of us who visited will probably have to do this too because curricula at different schools are not standardized. We will all have to go to class 6-8 hours a day, 6 days a week to do this, and the people who didn't visit this semester will resent those of us who did and think that we have an "edge" (which we probably would). I seriously doubt that Tulane will be in position to offer all the classes everyone individually needs to avoid this situation. Hell, I seriously doubt Tulane's contention that it will be operational (and New Orleans will be habitable) in the spring! This line of thinking is purely delusional and money-driven! It's really ironic that they dropped this bomb on us that we had to come back, with the rider that they are trying to get together a plan to inform us of HOW they're going to start classes in January, but they can't work on it because they are evacuating Houston because of ANOTHER HURRICANE! Basically they are really sticking it to the current law students: "Yeah, we know you're unhappy with the way we're dealing with this, but we don't care because the school needs to remain solvent." Why should students care about Tulane when Tulane doesn't care about them?
So this situation is really frustrating. University of Richmond has not yet informed the visiting students of what its policy regarding this development will be. I really hope that I am able to stay here indefinitely; if not, it might be time to re-evaluate law school, or at least postpone it again for a few years, because I would rather NOT be in school than BE in school in New Orleans. I'm never living there again. Will not. Can not. Go back. The health risks, the likelihood of many more evacuations and possible devastations in the next two years alone...not happening.
Sorry to end this post with all this negativity, I've been letting it simmer for a few days now and I am really upset about the whole thing. So I'll just get back to reading Civil Procedure and let it go for now...
posted by Lesley M @ 1:45 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home