It's business time
We are nearing the end of the semester, where multiple deadlines and responsibilities converge to bring out the stress and greatness in graduate students.
The symptoms that finals week at the Nicholas School is near: computer labs filling up with people, long lines forming outside of professors' doors, shorter conversations in the hall, coffee being consumed at higher than average rates, and the vanishing of smiling faces from the common areas.
I may be alone in saying this, but I find the final weeks of the semester to be an exciting time. This is where I get to take everything I've learned from the semester, synthesize it, and turn it into a final presentable product. In most cases, I receive confirmation on how much I've learned from sitting in class and completing problem sets week after week. Last year, after spending more than 30 hours on the GIS final assignment, I walked away with a complete report (with lots of pretty maps!) and confidence that I had a strong understanding of the fundamentals. I have never liked timed final exams and luckily I've only had to take one since coming to Duke. Most final products have been take home exams, term papers, and group projects.
The final weeks are a time of focus. Classes stop and all attention can be placed on the 4-5 assignments that need to be completed. It is far more convenient to have deadlines spread out so you can work on each one individually. However, sometimes all the assignments are due around the same day, which really forces you to split your time evenly and prioritize.
However, all is not serious and tense. I still will manage to fit in a two-day field trip to the North Carolina coast, grab a beer with a professor and fellow classmates, and attend FOREM's annual winter formal.
