Friday, December 14, 2012

The Art of "Fratting"


            Last year for the Fourth of July, I went to visit my sister in Boston.  My sister goes to Drexel university, and every other semester they do co-ops.  She had been to Boston a few times to visit one of her friends from home.  She loved it, so for her second co-op she decided to get a job in Boston.  Her and her boyfriend lived with some of the people my sister had met on her previous trips, at a MIT frat house.  Now that I have been to numerous frats at Penn State I decided to compare Penn State frats with MIT frats.
                First I will talk about the appearance of the frats; inside and outside.  The appearance of the outside of Penn State frats is really nice.  They are huge houses and most of the time they have really big lawns.  These frats are located off campus but they are generally all in the same area on “frat row”.  At MIT the outside appearance of the houses are extremely different.  Because of the fact that MIT is located in a city, the houses are either really close together, or connected.  The houses are still extremely nice but it is really different than being in a college town; the neighbors on either side of the house were millionaires.
 
                The inside of the houses is a different story.  If you are visiting a Penn State frat house when there is not a party going on, it is somewhat clean, but you can tell that it goes through a lot of wear and tear.  During the party’s the house is repulsive.  It is extremely messy and there are spills all over the house.  The people at the frat also have a tendency to force everyone to go into the basement, which is crowded, and uncomfortably hot.  There are frat brother that are in charge of “working” the party, which includes giving people drinks, and guarding the doors.
 
The inside of the frat house I went to at MIT was gorgeous.  It had a huge staircase in the middle of the house that went up numerous stories.  There were also side staircases that were all painted differently (one of them was painted like a piano and when turned on, it played like a piano as you went up or down the stairs).  I got a tour of the house which was extremely unique compared to every other frat house I have been to.  Each room had something interesting to see, or do.  For example, one of the rooms, which was called the net room, had a giant net going across the whole ceiling of the room.  You could craw around, sit in it, or even hang on the bottom of it.  When the party was going on the house wasn't crowded or discusting.  You were free to roam the house and most of the party happened on the roof where we had an excellent view of the Boston fireworks.
 
Another difference between Penn State frats and MIT frats is the people that are in it and their mentalities.  At Penn State, most people that join frats are just doing it for the parties.  Their main hobbies include drinking and talking to girls.  They go through the process of rushing and pledging, picking out only certain people to join.  At MIT everyone in the frats are extremely accepting of everyone and everything.  They make program light shows and play with liquid nitrogen for fun.  Their rush activities include eating carbonated fruit and playing with power tools.  Joining a frat at MIT doesn't only mean getting to go to parties, but also making numerous connections with unbelievable intelligent people.
 
Overall, there are many differences between MIT and Penn State frat houses.  If you are looking to go to a crazy party, visit a Penn State frat any Thursday, Friday, or Saturday night.  If you are looking for a fun experience, where you talk to intelligent interesting people and have a great time, take a trip to an MIT frat house.

I'll Make a Man out of You


           
              The art and cultural opportunity I chose to go to was the Red Shirt Remix.  This event is also sometimes referred to as RSR.  It is a THON related event for all of the rules and regulations committees to participate in.  Each committee has to make up a dance to a song and perform it for all of the other committees.  There are random judges who watch all the different groups dance and determine the winner.  The winner of this event gets to perform their dance during at THON!

This year the theme for RSR was musicals.  My committee went through a bunch of different options but finally settled on doing I’ll Make a Man out of You from Mulan.  In our committee we each have different positions.  There were two RSR chairs in my committee who were responsible for creating the dance.  The event took place right after we got back from thanksgiving break, and right before break I was in Tennessee playing soccer, so I missed all of the practices.

The girls that made the dance videotaped it and sent it to us so that we could all learn it.  I took some time to make sure I knew the dance so that I didn’t embarrass myself in front of all of the other committees.  About an hour before the performance our group met up, to do one last run through.  We all wore black pants, and a blue, green, and white tie-dyed shirt.  Our practice went well and we were ready to perform.

When we got to the HUB it was a little intimidating.  A lot of the other committees went all out for their performance.  One group dressed up as elderly people; they spray painted their hair gray, wore glasses, baggy grandparent clothing, walked hunched over, and even talked as if they were actually elderly!  Another committee was doing Annie so they all had buckets as props, they were all dressed in pajamas, they had “dirt” on their faces, and the girls put their hair up in pigtails to look like little orphans.
             Inside Alumni Hall was extremely crowded and hot!  As we awaited our turn to perform I got more nervous by the second.  Our group, To InJimmity and BeTHON, was set to go sixth.  Some of the people before us were amazing, which made me more nervous, but there were also some groups who made it obvious that they hadn’t had much practice.  My committee ended up doing really well.  All of the people on my committee nailed the moves, and at the end of our performance everyone was clapping.  This was a really good experience and it was interesting to see how we all started with the same criteria, and all ended up with such different dances.

Saturday, December 8, 2012

Course Wrap Up


1. Self-Evaluation
I haven’t even been at Penn State for a full semester and I have already learned so much.  One of the things that I have noticed recently is that these semesters go so fast and before I know it, my freshman year of college will be over! This is very scary to think about but this semester has been extremely fun, and I can’t wait to continue learning and experiencing new things.
To start off I learned a lot in the class English 015S alone!  I learned how helpful having other people opinions on your work can be.  The rough draft workshops helped my writing and made sure my final product was one of quality.  Also, most teachers just give you a grade without much feedback, but Ms. S gave so many specific details that enabled me to figure out where I was going wrong in my writing.  Doing a full revision of a paper gave me the idea of what it would like to be a professional writer where you have to edit and revise your work a hundred times before you print the final copy (which I would not enjoy).
 Finally, I learned that it is extremely important to have a focus and a specific audience when you are writing.  I have been given some assignments in the past where I just follow the rubric and just write to get it done.  In this class I learned that you need to start out writing your paper with a goal of what you want your readers to get out of the piece.  When you write something, sometimes it is for your own personal use, like a diary, but when it is shared with other people, you need to keep their interests in your mind as you are writing.
I also learned that you can learn a lot about yourself through writing.  When I first started writing my memoir I knew that my subject was something that had affected me but I wasn’t sure how.  I have always had trouble describing my feelings and beliefs.  As I was writing I actually learned a lot about myself.  I can see why people keep notebooks and journals as a way of expressing their feelings which sometimes might be easier to write down, then to show.
I learned a lot about Penn State and the community as a whole.  I have learned about what it means to be a student at Penn State, not only the academic expectation, but also the social expectations.  Our freshman class is very different than all of the past classes because this is a rebuilding year at Penn State.  We all chose this university even after the scandal had occurred and now we are shaping the “new Penn State”. 
       Overall, I learned that Penn State has so much to offer.   There are so many opportunities and resources that come along with your tuition including the writing center, free student run plays, and amazing teachers.  After going to some of the arts and cultural events, I figured out that these things are inexpensive and entertaining!  Being in English 015S taught me not only English, but also about myself and the University that I attend.

2. Blog Response Round-Up


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