It’s been a very long time since I was a student but I work at an academic institution, in the library. One of my favorite parts of my job is the start of the fall semester and helping out with the ice cream social the library holds to welcome new students and welcome back the returning ones. Mostly I just scoop and hand out cups of sorbet but if I could dispense some advice too it would be this: You’ll probably fail something at some point and it’s going to feel terrible but you’ll be fine. Sometimes, no matter how much work you do, no matter how much you prepare, you will fail, but you just keep going.
I’ve forgotten all the tests I failed. I’ve forgotten most of the tests I aced, too. The only test I really remember is one I did pass, barely. It’s the one D I’m proud of.
In my first few days at college I, along with all other freshmen, took a series of tests to gauge aptitude and to place us in classes not related to our majors. I’d already settled on majoring in English, but there was a biology test and I had two advantages: first, I’ve always been interested in science, and, second, I was lucky to have had some good science teachers. The counselor looked at my test and said Biology 101 would be a waste of my time; I should take Biology 125.
There were over a hundred of us in the classroom. I sat near the front and started talking to people around me. Everyone else was pre-med or nursing or something in science. I thought this was funny.
Then Dr. Barnstable came in. He was tall, stocky, with a dark combover. He wore a lab coat over his dress shirt and solid gray tie. He gave all of us a very stern look and said, “This is not a class for English majors. If you’re an English major leave. Now.”
I was rolling with laughter. I was an English major who’d killed the biology test. I could handle this.
The next day there was an ice cream social. Dr. Barnstable was there. I went over and introduced myself and said I was an English major. He told me to drop his class. I said that since I’d done so well on the introductory biology test I thought I’d stay.
“What’s a phospholipid?” he snapped.
I wasn’t expecting to be tested but I gave him a pretty good textbook answer.
He glared. He hit me with a few more questions, standard cell biology stuff, I thought, and I was able to fire back with answers. Finally he muttered, “Well, fine,” and walked away.
The truth is I struggled. The reading I could handle—hey, English major, reading comprehension is in the job description. The lab work, on the other hand, required math. I could have taken Physics or Chemistry 101 but I went for biology to avoid math. Nobody told me I’d need algebra to determine the oxygen consumption of mealworms in a tube.
Then there was the first test. I’d studied hard but I still sweated every question. When I got the test back with a big red D at the top I thought, okay, maybe this isn’t a class for English majors. When I told Dr. Barnstable I was dropping out, right before the start of the next class, he said, “I’m sorry to see you go.” I assumed he didn’t recognize me and said that to all dropouts.
A week later I passed one of the guys I knew from the class. He asked why I’d dropped out. I told him I didn’t do so well on the test.
“Yeah,” he said, “almost everybody failed. I think only three people passed it.”
I still don’t regret dropping out. In the spring I took Chemistry 101, and did pretty well. For an English major.
Sounds like the professor was the issue, not you!
The professor was definitely the issue. But I’m still glad I dropped out of that biology class. In the chemistry class I took the next semester we got to play with radioactive crystals.
You are such a fine storyteller, Chris. A+++
Signed,
Another English major
We English majors need to stick together. I see a lot of poorly written science articles and think they could use help from those of us who’ve studied writing.