Unwashed, Messy, and Slightly Dazed

There are few things that I dislike more than disorganization.

Of course, my mother would always politely disagree, and my floormates would be of the same mind—I’m a messy person. The Carman double that I live in tends to end up strewn with everything from schoolwork and clothes to books and ballet slippers (Both occupants of the room contribute relatively equal amounts to a floor that ends up looking like a disaster zone). However, there is some semblance of organization to the indiscernible pile of “stuff.” I can find almost anything in my room in two seconds—other than my cell phone, which I manage to lose several times a day. Name it, and I’ll be able to point you to it within five centimeters of floor area and one centimeter of depth. What bothers me are places that give a sense of utter chaos, such as stacks of papers in which nothing can be found without tearing the whole thing down. Physically, this translates to a sensation of milling about in a manner much akin to that of sheep (and tourists in Times Square. Good God, I can’t stand walking through that place).

The latter feeling has permeated a lot of my experiences at Columbia so far. The hunger strikers’ (oh God, not those again, you say) demands were vague at best. It’s not just those really “big” things that manage to hit the news which suffer from acute “I-didn’t-think-this-through” syndrome, though. There seems to be a perpetual disconnect between what one person hears and what another one does, or just a general chaos.

In my first days as a prefrosh, there was a giant scuffle among the international members of the class of 2011 to receive their “fake” SSNs in order to be able to set up their CU e-mail. One helpful girl posted that she had simply called such-and-such number and they had given it to her. I phoned said number—I was apparently calling the wrong department. The person on the other end of the line connected me to someone else, and after three other such calls, I returned to the first department I’d contacted. There, a different person told me that I would have to wait for a few days to receive it by e-mail, and promptly hung up. That wild goose chase over, I hoped it would be the last of my Columbia career.

Alas, this was not the case. Since arriving, I have found it impossible to register for piano courses—this semester, the instructor had to personally enroll every student in the program due to restrictions imposed on registration that were contrary to what the music department had requested. The Lit Hum classes across the board are inconsistent in the material they study and in what depth, in addition to their homework assignments—my teacher requires weekly online discussion and two four-page papers, while a friend’s Lit Hum professor instead asks for a 15-page discussion paper.

Why are things this way? I suppose the answer is simple—miscommunication definitely plays a huge role. My piano teacher told me that in the fall semester, someone had blocked off the course thinking that it would be easier for the instructor to register people by hand—“She was just trying to help”—but he was reassured that it would not happen again. This semester, however, seems to be another game of broken telephone— the piano course isn’t even listed in the online bulletin.

It would seem that all of these problems are easy to fix. Is it so difficult to follow the requests of a department about how to register for a course? And how hard could it be to set standards across the board for Lit Hum? The chemistry department manages to do it just fine with General Chemistry, where students have the same number of exams and quizzes, and grades are weighted in the same manner. One cannot always take out every variation among professors—my roommate and I receive similar grades in chemistry, but the class mean in my class is about 20 percent higher than hers, meaning that I’m far less likely to get an A. Even if Lit Hum courses had the same assignments across the board, like University Writing, there would still be the variable of the professor’s marking scheme. However, it’s much more fair to the student to have at least some sense of balance. I can’t complain too much about my chemistry professor because I chose his class for its time without looking at CULPA, but my acquaintance struggling in Lit Hum had no input on which section she would be in. Would it hurt so much to make clear instructions, and to follow said instructions? Is there really any harm in clearing up the Lit Hum course system?

Here’s a call, then, for organization—or rather, communication. More communication means less frustration in any area. Columbia aside, it can be seen everywhere. For example, at the U.N. the other week, I and several other volunteers found ourselves often missing a very, very important person carrying a very, very important item. It totalled an hour of waiting time that could have been better spent doing other things. There are always hitches along the way, but a greater effort at preventing these blips would mean a much more organized world. A little less mess would be lovely.