Top Five Ways the Exam Period Brings Out the Worst in People

Published April 29, 2008

1. All the informal but strictly-observed ethics of waiting for a computer in the library go straight out the window. Students weave around the first floor computers like hungry sharks. The casual line that used to start near the reference desk is a waiting area for those who are inadaptable, unfit for the survival now needed in this academic climate.

2. At a time when no one wants to be immortalized in photographs, everyone comes to the naked bike-ride with their little digital 10 mega-pixel cameras. The spectacle turns into a veritable UVM paparazzi event. I guess there’s nothing quite like having a keepsake of some wildly drunk, anonymous student’s genitalia stored on your hard drive.

3. The ability of UVM students to discuss anything from John Maynard Keynes to Jon Bon Jovi ends. The different on-campus conversations slowly devolve into only three varieties: talking about how much work you have while stalling to do it, talking about how much work you should be doing while at Red Rocks, talking about how much work you wish you didn’t have while smoking outside the library.

4. Deeply connected to #3: our already self-centered college-enclosed lives becomes exponentially more selfish as everyone complains and vents about their problems, their work level, their exorbitant coffee drinking, while not paying attention when someone else complains about the same things.

5. General decency and morality declines as the line “Well, the year’s almost over” is used to justify anything from stealing from the “un-chill” kid down the hall who always harshed your mellow to making out with you friend’s ex when he or she is in the other room…perhaps I have said too much.

Print This Article

Comments