Course Evaluation for: SOC101: Socializing in College for First-Year Commuters
On a scale of 1 to 10, how likely would you be to recommend this course to a friend?
Friend. *snort* Yeah right.
0/10. Not at all. In fact, I would probably suggest taking enough AP courses in high school to let them skip their first semester altogether. If nothing else, at least it would give them a few extra months to learn how to drive.
Did this course challenge you?
Yeah but not in the “this course motivated me to do better and excel in ways I never thought I could” way I assume you’re talking about. More in a “walking out of the movie theaters on April 27, 2018, and saying, ‘Wow, it was really challenging for the Avengers to try to stop Thanos’” way.
Did this course have any required materials? If so, how easy was it to acquire them?
A driver’s license and car or comparable form of reliable transportation to and from campus. Not the course’s fault but this ended up being stressful as hell because I only got my learner’s permit five months before the semester started. Over the summer I was spending eleven hours or so a week practicing driving on backroads, on highways, in downtown, at night, in the rain, and so on. So by the time the Monday before the start of classes rolled around, and I finally got my license, I was exhausted. The semester hadn’t even begun yet.
How knowledgeable and effective was the instructor for this course?
Lol. Lmao, even. What do you mean “instructor”? There was no instructor for this course. No syllabus was provided. I had assignments, but they were often assigned randomly and at the last minute with no instructions on how best to complete them, let alone any feedback to keep in mind. I might be more successful next time I tried socializing. The only predictable assignment was the weekly homework: “Think of Something Even Remotely Cool to Say to Your Pretty Classmate Who Also Happens to Be a Singer Which Is Intimidating as Hell Because You’ve Never Done Anything Cool.” This was assigned like clockwork every Wednesday at 9:45A.M. and due the following Monday morning at 8:30A.M. – a repetition that, as the semester drew on, became tedious at best and borderline Saw trap content at worst.
Did I do well on any of these assignments? Who the fuck knows. There was no one grading them. I’m pretty sure I bombed the final on “Find a Couple Acquaintances to Stay in Touch with Over Winter Break” though. The exam had two parts, each involving reaching out to a different classmate. I blew Part 1 by chickening out and waiting until the last possible second of the last time I would be seeing them that semester to bring it up and then wasn’t even able to find them. And after that I didn’t even bother taking Part 2.
The only guidance I got came from a fourth-year student who seemed to notice the course’s instructor-less nature and my subsequent nervous floundering a few weeks in and stepped in to help me out where she could. And for better or worse, these small bits of encouragement were enough to motivate me to keep making an effort even when it felt like the class was actively trying to make me fail. But given that she didn’t have to do this, she just did it out of her own kindness, sorry, I’m not giving the course itself any credit for this.
For an introductory class, how manageable was the course’s workload?
See, I would say not so bad, given that the coursework was of a more abstract, intellectual nature than it was for my other classes. The sort of thing you can viciously obsess and spiral over on the way home each day, rather than having to actually write up a research paper or put together a PowerPoint presentation twice because your computer crashed when you were almost done with it the first time, and you had to start all over.
However, given that this is, like you said, an introductory course, I’m not feeling that lenient towards it. Because, listen, I had six other classes this semester, including an Honors politics course I had no interest in and a 200-level U.S. history course. And none of these ended with me crying under the Christmas lights in my bedroom for a solid half-hour the last week of classes because I was certain I’d failed the final and the course overall.
What other general suggestions do you have to improve this course?
Include a syllabus.
Have an instructor, or at the absolute minimum, a tutoring service.
Offer some stable chances to socialize. In defense of my probably-failing grade in this class, it’s damn near impossible to succeed in a class with “Socializing” right there in the title when I’m constantly deprived of chances to do so. Classes were frequently cancelled. Classmates sometimes weren’t there even when they were held. And it’s not my fault I fumbled the “Join a Club” assignment back in Week 2 because if the Sci-Fi/Fantasy Guild I was excited to join has been defunct for years, why the hell was it still listed as active on the website? Just make the course feel more secure and supportive, so students don’t have to go through their whole first semester feeling like they’re the punchline of some big academic joke.
And, I don’t know, maybe this course should count for some actual credits? Because I think it’s total bullshit that I made it through this course with little to no guidance, crashed out and wondered, “What’s the point of even trying?” more times than I can count, and still put way more effort into this course than I needed to for any of my other classes all semester, and I have nothing to show for it.
Thank you for your feedback!
We will take all students’ comments into consideration
to revise this course in the future!
Zachary Rice is a junior at the University of Hartford in Hartford, CT, pursuing a degree in English Creative Writing. His poetry has previously appeared in Blue Marble Review, and Aerie, the University of Hartford’s literary journal. His favorite genres to read and write are science fiction and fantasy, and he loves Marvel, Halloween, and watching football.
