Selecting Classes

The semester is finally underway, and after weeks and weeks of dreading the onslaught of a full course load I am finally starting to adjust, and I am slowly starting to organize my schedule. And while I am hesitantly confident in succeeding this semester, I do wish my schedule was a bit more condusive to, well, sleep.

The nice thing about most classes here is that, like many other schools, you have options as far as what to take and when to take them. The only real exception (of which I am aware) is our Architecture department, because the curriculum there is extremely rigid. They found a schedule that works for them and they are sticking to it.

For almost any other department, though, you have some freedom to create your own schedule as you see fit. Don't like getting up in the morning? Take all your classes after eleven. Want to get them all done before lunch? See if you can schedule three of your classes in the morning. Professors are likely to teach multiple classes each day, and they can be offered at a couple different times. Most academic departments understand that not everyone will have the same schedule, and for the lower-level classes that everyone has to take, they will make sure the timing allows for almost everyone to take them.

Now, depending on the class you may have a few different options. Some classes are offered in the morning and some are offered later that same day, so you can choose whether to go to class earlier or later. You may also have the option to take classes on a Monday/Wednesday schedule or a Tues/Thurs schedule. This means you have a lot of wiggle room when selecting your classes. If there is a class that you need to take that is only offered at one specific time one specific day, then you can register for your other class on a day that is more convenient for you.

*insert flashing lights and sirens here*

Word to the wise: you may be tempted to try to squeeze all your classes into three or four days to give yourself a day or two free during the week for homework/jobs/whatever. You may even be tempted to take the Tues/Thurs evening class even though they run for two and a half hours because you won't have to take the Mon/Wed/Fri class in the mornings. Unless your schedule demands this of you or you are some freak of time management, please rethink your decision!

I have made this mistake before. Twice, actually. I am surprised I didn't get the picture the first time. I had the option of taking Differential Equations in the morning Monday, Wednesday, and Friday for an hour a piece, or take the class for just shy of three hours twice a week. I opted for the latter, even though the class ran from 6:30-9 at night. Needless to say I was not exactly thrilled halfway through the semester when I was slowly starting to run out of stamina. My free Friday just became the time I used to fit in all my homework, and my free time went down the drain.

I am not saying this is a bad idea for you. If you can make it work and still have time for fun things, go for it! But in my personal experience, spreading out your classes a bit will give you more time during the week to work on homework, not to mention more sleep time during the week too, so that when Friday comes along, you can take your one morning class and have the rest of the day (and possible weekend) to do the stuff you like, like joining a student organization or heading downtown. Do whatever works best for you; if you plan it right, you'll be able to take the classes when you want, do homework when you want, and not drive yourself insane. In the end, that's all any of us really want out of college classes, isn't it?

Engineering Classes at IIT

When I was in high school, I wasn't sure what exactly I wanted to do when I graduated, but one thing was for sure. There was no way I was going into engineering. I decided to study architecture instead. And when that failed to work out like I was hoping, I realized that all of the things I missed (math, science, logic) were all the important parts of engineering! So I decided to make the switch to architectural engineering, and I couldn't be happier. And I don't think I could have gotten where I am now without the help of IIT (I know that sounds really lame and a lot like a cheesy commercial, but bear with me here).

You see, the cool thing about the engineering programs here (any program, really) is that you get the chance to see from your first semester what your chosen profession will be like once you graduate. It was how I figured out architecture wasn't for me, and it was how I figured out how architectural engineering was. You jump right into specialty classes which you take right along side your general education requirements. This past semester I was able to take Physics III and Thermal Fluids Engineering simultaneously; they shared similar concepts and I was able to use both together to learn the material better than if I was taking either on its own.

Also, one of my professors is trying something new. Dr Snyder, who taught my Fluids class, and also taught my Illumination class, is spending a lot of his time trying to use Blackboard in new ways. Most of the high schools in the area already use Blackboard, but for those that are not aware, the Blackboard Academic Suite is an online program that teachers can use to post homework assignments, slide shows, grades, links, notes, and more, all for the students to access at their leisure.



What Dr Snyder is doing is, as he puts it, "flipping the classroom." He teaches the Thermo class online as well as in person, so he has a collection of his lectures that were taped for the online students. These lectures were posted to Blackboard along with the notes he took for the class (book pages, photos of the whiteboards, PDF's, etc.) for us to use as students in his in-person class. Now, if a professor does this, it is usually just there as an extra resource for the students to use. With Dr Snyder, though, he actually makes us watch the lectures on our own as "homework." We "go to lecture" on our own time. This is great, because I can pause and rewind the lecture. I can even break up the lecture into manageable chunks, and split it up into multiple days. This way if I ever find myself getting tired, distracted, whatever, I can put it off until a time where I will be more focused.

And because we are watching the lectures outside of class, when we actually come to class, we do homework. My professor will give us a set of problems to do during the class, and we work on them in teams of four. So not only are we working on our "homework" in groups, but our professor is there to answer any questions we might (or rather, will) have on the problems. Dr Snyder knows that one of the best ways to learn material is to learn it yourself. "Self-directed learners" tend to learn things faster and better than regular students, and this class arrangement allows everyone to learn in that fashion while still having the professor for support.

Watching the lectures on our own time helps us to learn the material at our own pace, and when we come to class, we are able to use our team to get through the problems without getting stuck, since we have our classmates as well as our professor as a resource. I love this class format, since the homework gets done in class (thereby relieving some of the homework stress I would normally have), I learn the material better, and we get tested every week, which can be a bit hard sometimes, but it helps to reinforce what we learn. And all the tests are on Blackboard too, so we can take the test when we feel we are ready (as long as we take it by a weekly due date, of course).

Now, most classes are not taught this way, even at Illinois Tech. This is something brand-new my professor decided to test-drive last summer, and it seems to be working very well. Most classes are your standard lecture- or lab-based class, though there are variations to this tried-and-true formula. It's just a way that we are trying to innovate where we might see a need to. It's kind of a theme here. That's not to say though that "regular" classes are not committed to your success. You have at your disposal your professor (who has scheduled office hours), your TA (again, who has his/her own office hours), your classmates, and the ARC, or Academic Resource Center, which is supplied with computers, textbooks, and tutors who can help you through almost any class or assignment.

We do a lot of innovating at this school. And part of the professors' jobs mean preparing students to do the same both while they're here and when they are released into the world. And what comes out of all this innovation/research can be completely surprising. It could be something small, like Silly Putty or Pop Tarts, or it could be something important like magnetic tape or the cell phone (all of these things have either been invented here at Illinois Tech or by an alumnus). Even the students here get in on the action. The IPRO's are a great example. Much of the research and prototyping done through our IPRO program results in new things.

The labs are some of my favorite classes here. I usually didn't like them in high school. High school was all about learning how to write reports and learning things you already knew. Though dissecting that pig was pretty awesome. No, here, it's a lot different. Since you already know the principles of writing reports (which obviously changes a bit from high school as the ones you will write here will be a bit different) you can spend most of your effort on the actual labs, which are really cool--and you actually learn stuff! A lot of them are things you might actually do in the field, like soil studies or surveying. That is not to say that the lab reports don't take a lot of time. They definitely do, but the thought processes as to the formatting aren't as heavy-duty once you know how to put the report together. Your results may vary, of course.

All these things apply to our engineering programs, whether we are talking about Computer Engineering, Civil Engineering, Biomedical Engineering, or Architectural Engineering. The things we do here ensure that what we are teaching is the most current material we can offer. Many schools have faculty that know everything there is to know about their respective subjects from ten years ago. At IIT, we make sure that our professors keep up to date with their engineering and math and science so you are learning about developments in your respective fields as they happen. This ensures that when you graduate you have to do as little catch-up as possible when you are thrown out the door with that shiny new engineering degree in your hands. It is a wonderful thing to say the least.

IIT in the 70's

Just recently IIT posted a link on its Facebook page to a YouTube video of a film from around 1972 showing off the IIT campus. I always like seeing how things have changed since "the old days." But what surprised me more than anything else was how things haven't changed.

That's not to say we are behind on the times on anything. Things haven't changed because even in the 70's we were committed to staying on top of technological developments. Things haven't changed because we haven't really had to. What motivated us then still motivates us now, and the reason we were a great college then is the reason we are one of the best colleges today.
The buildings are the same ones that you see today minus a few exceptions. And they look just as modern today as they did back then. And even in the 70's the buildings had some history to them. The professors have just as much dedication to staying on the forefront of scientific developments as they do now. Heck, the tables and chairs in the library are the same! The biggest difference between now and then is the amount of facial hair all the men are sporting in the 70's. Though, being a college student you can still see plenty of that today, just with some more hipster-y flair.

If you can deal with some mildly irritating synthesizer music, please check out the video!

If you make it to 9:00, you will hear some chiming in the background. That's not some strange musical decision made by the soundtrack composer. Did you know IIT used to have a carillon? True story! It used to chime three times a day, and ran off of an electric system that used magnetic tape to play the chimes. It last played not long after this film was made, after some grumps in Wishnick Hall decided it was too annoying. But it is still here! The machinery being so old, it is probably long past repair (within a respectable budget, that is), but in the basement where I work, there is a glass-walled room that houses the chimes and the old equipment that would play them every day. It's quite a sight, and if you ask the Admissions Office nicely enough, maybe they'll show it to you. Here's a glimpse from photos I found here:

I work right next to this thing every day, and it wasn't until years later that I actually noticed what was in the glass room and someone told me what it was. It's amazing how something so big and unusual can go unnoticed. If you live in a big city long enough you stop looking up at all the tall buildings. I think if we all try to act like a tourist more often we wouldn't miss out on some of the cooler things in life. Maybe there are some other interesting remnants from the old days at IIT. It's up to us to check them out!

Engineering and Ethics

The other day I was joking about how architects get praised when a building is successful and popular, and engineers only get credit for a building if it falls down. While funny and true some of the time, it is important to note that architectural engineer's job is all about safety and that, while we don't save lives per se, our jobs need to be done as precisely as a doctor's, and are about keeping people safe whether they are in our buildings or not.

Engineering Ethics is all about making sure the choices we make while building a structure are the right things to do. Many professions will not lose much if they cut a few corners here or there. An author may still do well if his book has a plot hole or two, and a singer can be extremely popular even if her voice isn't exactly pitch-perfect.

Building engineers, on the other hand, have to make sure everything they do is perfect. They can't afford to cut corners, which sounds like an oxymoron of sorts. If an engineer takes a shortcut, it will almost certainly be becuase he wants to save some money. And this can work very well in the short term. But this isn't ethical. Even a small shortcut can be catastrophic when we are talking about a building, and this can end up costing a lot more in the long run than the engineer was hoping for.

The Tacoma Narrows Bridge. One of the most common
case studies in Engineering Ethics

Say you, the architectural engineer, are tasked with building a modest skyscraper. The project manager has given you your budget and you are all set to get your materials in order. You know you don't have an infinite supply of money, so what do you do when it comes to choosing your supplier for the steel framework? You can't get the top-of-the-line stuff on your budget, not by a long shot, so you decide to get the cheapest stuff you can find, which happens to be some small operation overseas who has promised you the absolute best price on the materials you need. Was this a good idea?

Of course not!

It's like when you are shopping for, say, electronics. You could by the five-dollar no-name earphones at the discount store, but it is extremely likely your cheap-o equipment will not even work when you take it out of the box. You are better off paying a few extra dollars to get a pair of headphones from a brand you trust. Wasn't that worth the extra money?

The same thing can be applied to engineering. Except getting the cheapest equipment could cost you more than a few extra dollars. If you don't make sure you are using quality materials on your project (or hire quality workers), your building may not stand up properly. And if something goes wrong, your building has a chance of collapsing. And that runs the risk of hurting people. Defnitely more of a dangerous game than just buying a cheap pair of headphones.

This is what happens when engineering ethics is ignored.

One of the first classes you'll take as an engineer at IIT (whether architectural or structural or any other type) is Engineering Ethics. Your professor will take an entire semester or more expanding on this topic and by the end of the class you can be confident that the decisions you make on the job are the right ones, whether the topic be managing construction, like I've mentioned here, or things such as whistleblowing and the general principles that all engineers should live by. If you're curious, the Wikipedia page has a lot of good info. There's even this site which has a lot of case studies for you to peruse.

This is not meant to scare you. This is meant to show you how important an engineer's job is, and even if you won't see your name on the building if it ever finds its way on the Register of Historic Buildings, you'll know that the reason it was able to stand up long enough to get onto that list is because you made the right decisions putting it together, and that in itself should be enough.

Around Town: Ferro's

Around Town is meant to introduce you to the neighborhood surrounding IIT's Main Campus and show you some of the things you can do (and eat!) close to campus without spending a ton of money. First on the list is...

Ferro's! Just across the highway on 31st Street, this unassuming building is home to some of the best (and cheapest!) Chicago food near campus. Whether you are looking for a classic Chicago-style hot dog, a hamburger, or even an omelette and pancakes, this place has something for you.

As soon as you walk in you are overwhelmed by the sheer size of the menu. Breakfast items, sandwiches, beef, salads, Chicago tamales (?), the list goes on. But if you are a bit indecisive, turn your attention to the wall on the left. Here you will find only ten choices to choose from, but these are arguably the best things on the menu. The specials listed here are delicious, and you can choose from a two-hot-dog-and-fries meal to a hamburger and others.

The nice thing about this smaller menu is that it is great for the poor college students that we are. Ferro's has a punch card just for college students (i.e. us), and for every special you get off this menu, you get a punch. Fill up the card and get a free lunch! And this means there is no excuse not to try a Chicago dog if you've never had one before. And ask for a char dog if you're in the mood for something grilled. For the out-of-towners, a Chicago dog has mustard, onion, Chicago-style relish, tomato wedges, sport peppers, and celery salt. And absolutely no ketchup!

They just recently added a whole new section to their menu, dubbed "City-Que." Someone in the kitchen must have really been jonesin' for some barbeque, because they bought a smoker and now there is a whole new menu's-worth of BBQ options. Pulled pork, rib tips, and beef brisket are just a few things on this new menu. It is surprisingly delicious, and my favorite item from this section is, strangely enough, the Pulled Pork Cheese Fries. It doesn't exactly sound like a good combination going in, especially since I am not a fan of the cheese sauce American fast-food joints slather on everything, but this thing is fantastic! The pulled pork really makes this dish and pairs unusually well with the sauce, and this is perfect on one of those days where you need a pick-me-up after just finishing an extra-hard exam and you don't care whether you live or die.

My favorite thing here though is one of their specialties: Italian Ice. There are a few places in Bridgeport that offer this, but Ferro's is my favorite. A lot of flavors to choose from, but my go-to flavor is strawberry. All the flavors are made with real fruit and it is just the ticket on a hot summer day.

This place certainly will not be winning any beauty contests, and isn't the five-star cuisine you might find near the Loop or elsewhere, but this place is fast and cheap has something everyone can enjoy--and if you have a friend who's a vegetarian, you can tell them to just deal with it and get a pepper-and-egg sandwich. Within walking distance of campus, definitely check this place out.

So.... What is Architectural Engineering?

All this talk about fraternities is all well and good, but this blog has to be called "ArchE-typical" for some reason or another, right? So, in order to make this blog's name appropriate, how about I talk about what I do?

The most common question I get asked as a student ambassador (who also happens to be studying Architectural Engineering) is, what is the difference between Architecture and Architectural Engineering? I am asked this by almost everyone going into either field, and this is completely okay! Architectural Engineering is still a fairly new major, and it doesn't help Illinois Tech offers both, or that in some countries, the terms can mean the same thing!
Architecture has been around for a long time. Like, a long time. Ancient civilizations and all that. Just about any building can be called architecture, from the Taj Mahal to the Sears Tower to the storage shed behind your house. And someone had to design all these things. The person who designs a building (what it looks like, what its purpose is, where it should go) is called an architect. And this is what Architecture is all about.

Architecture.

Architecture.

Also, Architecture.

Architectural Engineering, on the other hand, has only been around for a decade or so, at least by name. As buildings became more complex, engineers were needed to see the construction of the building through. Architects called upon structural engineers who could design the support structures to make sure the building wasn't going to fall over. They had electrical engineers work out how all the wiring was going to be put in the building. They had engineers whose jobs were to only analyze the building in terms of plumbing, or fire safety.

If you were going to build something, whether it be a house or a skyscraper, you pretty much had to hire an engineering dream team in order to get the thing built. Well, as you can well imagine, the people who were paying for these buildings were getting tired of spending all this money on several engineers to work on one project. And frankly, I don't blame them. Engineers are expensive! They realized they could probably save a few bucks if they could find one person who knew about all these things, instead of having to hire three (or four, or seven) separate people/firms on a project. Thus, Architectural Engineering was born!

To simplify things a bit, an Architectural Engineer (or Building Engineer, if you want to avoid the inevitable confusion with an Architect) has background in the following fields:

-Structural Engineering
-Electrical Engineering
-Geotechnical (Soil) Engineering (this would apply to a building's foundation)
-Illumination Engineering
-Acoustical Engineering
-Mechanical Engineering (this would include things like HVAC)
-Construction Management
-and the list goes on...

So, to put it simply, Architecture the process of designing the aesthetics of a building, and Architectural Engineering is the process of actually building the thing. Put another way, if a building is successful, the architect gets the credit. If a building fails (read: falls down), it is the engineer's fault. Unfortunately, that's just the way it is!

Hooray Architect!

Hooray Engineer!

If you decide to study Architectural Engineering, and I definitely urge you to consider it, you have the option of choosing where to specialize. At IIT you will take classes that will introduce you to Acoustical and Illumination Engineering or other specialized departments, but it is up to you if you want to pursue these areas to the fullest. If you would rather be a Fire Safety Engineer, or a Plumbing Engineer, take those classes that apply to these fields and get your specialization! But you will have to at least have some background in all of these departments to get your degree and become a licensed engineer.
My plan is to specialize in Acoustical Engineering and set myself up for working on music halls and the like. I am a musician, so to be able to connect two of my passions together would be amazing. I also have a minor in Architecture, but that is another story.

If you have any questions about Architectural Engineering or Architecture, shoot me an email or post a comment! Choosing a major can be a confusing and difficult decision, and I want to help in any way I can, even if that means suggesting something totally crazy like Computer Science or Psychology!

Song of the Day

The Cinematics - A Strange Education



Fraternities and the Media

I was recently pointed to an article listing some of the most notorious college fraternities in the country. Thankfully, my own fraternity, Alpha Sigma Phi, did not make the list (though I wasn't exactly holding my breath), but it did give me reason to bring up (again) the topic of the fraternity and how it is viewed by the media.

You may or may not remember a post I wrote a while back about my experience in joining a fraternity, and I mentioned how fraternities do not have the best reputation. While I did make it a point to reference films like "Animal House" and "Old School," among others, I really did not talk about where the ideas for these films came from.

One of the most important (if obvious) factors to consider is the media. While the morning news can be informative, have you ever noticed how the majority of the news that is neither traffic nor weather is depressing? I catch snippets of the news on my way to and from work and, I have to tell you, there may be a few happy stories in there, but most of it is about crime, political corruption, or death. Many of you already know this, but for the benefit of those individuals who are not conspiracy theorists or sociologists is it important to realize that news programs choose what they air/broadcast/publish based on what their listeners/viewers/readers want to hear. Every news program has traffic. Every news program has weather. Every news program has that one story about a cute new animal that has been born at the local zoo. But every news channel has their own style.

Different channels tend to have content with different spins on the same material, or even different material all together. You might have two channels reporting on the same landmark Supreme Court decision, and while one news group may be reporting the results with a positive air, the other network might be giving the same results with a hint of disapproval. Most schools that offer journalism will tell their students to be objective in their reporting, but sadly this isn't always the case in real life.

This is not to say that news programs are all liars, and they are conditioning us to be good citizens who sit on our rears and let ourselves be spoonfed all of the nonsense and B.S. the government wants us to believe (I am not that crazy). News groups can choose what they want to air, and 90% of the time these segments are true stories with reputable sources.

On the topics of fraternities, however, it seems like most news networks have the same general idea about fraternities. "Fraternities are nothing but trouble," news anchors will tell their viewers, and no matter how many fraternity brothers stand up and protest, the media does not change. Maybe I'm wrong and all fraternities are evil (this would be the least likely). Maybe the producer of one news program got the stomach flu off some bad seafood served to him by a waiter with a fraternity tattoo on his arm (ever-so-slightly more likely). Or, as seems to be the case to me, news networks are simply catering to the masses who generally believe, to my disappointment, that fraternities are groups of wretched, soulless ne'er-do-wells who would rather get drunk and put their friends at risk than lend a hand for their neighbor.

And this is where we get movies like "Animal House." They are based off of the media, which is based off of what it thinks we, the common masses, believe. Typically, we don't desire to see a movie that goes strongly against what we believe. And the same thing goes for the mass media. While there is definitely news, and some very good news too, some of it is purely for entertainment, or else to reaffirm our views on a topic.

I'm getting to the point,  I swear.

Because of the negative stigma fraternities have, much of what you hear on the six o'clock news is about hazing gone awry, or the death of a brother due to the stupidity of one chapter. Indeed, this does happen, but not with the regularity we are led to believe. This is because there is almost never any coverage on a fraternity who raises money for organizations like Livestrong, or a chapter who has made substantial progress in improving its surrounding neighborhood. Stories like this happen all the time, be we never hear about them because they are not nearly as entertaining or startling as the ones that are promoted on the news now.

Now, I know that most fraternities are not nearly as bad as the media makes them out to be, and if I have done my job correctly, you do too. So our task then is to tell the world about all the good fraternities do, not just for the communities at large (which is great), but the good it can do for the individuals who are in these fraternities. Fraternities can change lives, and more often than not it is a positive change. Some of the most well-known and most successful individuals today (Warren Buffet, for example, who is an Alpha Sig) attribute part of their success to the values learned and friends made while in a fraternity. I myself have been converted from an individual who wanted nothing to do with fraternities because of the stories I've heard to a person who is proud to be a member of a fraternity.

I have nothing bad to say about my chapter, and I want others to experience the pride I have for my fraternity. Maybe one day the media will finally get the picture about what fraternities really are, but until then it is up to us to inform the world on what we are truly capable of.

My fraternity's motto is "Causa Latet Vis Est Notissima," or "The Cause is Hidden, the Results Well Known." Not everyone is going to know what goes on in a fraternity, but darn it if we are not going to show the world the great things we can do because of our involvement in Alpha Sigma Phi.

Summer Time

It seems to me like the summer is really getting to me. Summertime is for hanging out with friends, going to the beach, vacationing, relaxing, generally being in a happy mood. But I am in a sort of rut now, I think. Playing video games and watching movies can get you only so far through a summer. And as weird as it is to say, I think I may be looking forward to going back to school, if only for something to do.

I have been taking summer school every year for a long time, so being done this late in the summer is strange. My family's vacation is not dependent on my school schedule, and I have more "me" time, at least when I am not working. But having non-stop classes for so long messes with my mind. Because now that I am done for the whole summer, I don't know what to do with myself.

During the academic year, there is always something going on. Organizations have events, your friends are hanging out, you have to go downtown to buy groceries and supplies, and of course there is lots and lots of studying to be had in between classes. Thanksgiving break and Christmas Vacation were just long enough where you had some room to breathe but not so long that you start to get restless. You knew you were going back to school in a few weeks and you could use the time to prepare or start ramping up the relaxing process.

In the summer, you can take a summer class to get ahead in your academic schedule or even to retake a class you might not have done well in before. And they usually take up about half the summer, so you only have about the same amount of time as Christmas Vacation to relax, which I am totally used to.

But now... My summer class has been done a couple weeks now, I have received my grade, and now there is nothing left for me but work all week and try to relax. I am not sure what to do anymore. There's no homework to do when I get home, no test looming over my head, no missing assignments that nag me every night until I fall asleep. All this stress-free living is driving me up a wall. I am starting to come up with excuses to mark up a calendar. I am starting to think about work while I am at home. I am starting to think about studying something, anything. It is freaking me out.

This is what trying to relax feels like. Relaxing is so....stressful!

So, I think what I am trying to say is, I think I miss school.

Whoah. Did I really just say that?

Oh no wait, I didn't, because I wrote it. Okay, I feel better.

No, that's a lie. It still feels weird.

But I think the weirdest part of all of it is that I am on campus every day for my job. Still giving campus tours and filing applications just like always! But I am on campus without any classes to go to. It's like the school is taunting me!

Fortunately (if any of the rest of you can call it that) I move back into the fraternity house August 6th. The semester doesn't start until the 20th, but we have Work Week, where everyone living in the house moves in early and we work on house repairs, clean things up, and generally do the kinds of chores that are only necessary once a semester. The plan is to start earlier than we usually do (hence the early move-in date) so we have some time to relax and prepare for the impending cranial onslaught that is the fall semester.

Can't say hard labor really appeals to me all that much, but I am looking forward to getting back together with my brothers and getting ready for the fall.

Stress and the Galloping Ghost

It always surprises me how busy my summers seem to get, especially when, if I think about it, I really only have a handful of things going on at any given time. During the school year it was overwhelming but controllably so, since usually going out and doing things required some extra planning, and you could organize events and classes and tests months in advance.

The problem with the summer is that a lot of plans that come up are very spur-of-the-moment, and it's easy to get incredibly stressed out any given day, even if you weren't stressed out yesterday and you won't be stressed out two days from now. During the year it's very much like a constant, grinding, mild stress that doesn't go away until the next vacation, and it almost fades into the background like when you have been in a room with a strong odor long enough. Summer? Well, it's much shorter, but it can be more intense. I don't really know which I prefer. I'd rather not have to deal with either.

Today is a perfect example of what I am talking about. Today as an isolated event was fantastic. But look ahead three days and it doesn't feel so great because--guess what--I already have summer session midterms on Thursday! Wonderful.

Okay, so some background on my day. One of my best friends had a party since she graduated from Eastern Illinois University not a month ago, and some long-lost relatives visited us today, just to say hello. And, not to knock my friends and family (sorry!), maybe the best part of today was my trip to the Galloping Ghost with three of my friends.

For those not in the know, which, if I had to guess, would be most of you, the Galloping Ghost in Brookfield is a video arcade. It's the largest arcade in Illinois, and the second-largest in the country. The owners collect old arcade cabinets (from sellers, dumps, and wherever else they can find them) and refurbish them and line them all up in this little storefront on Ogden Avenue for anyone to play.

The difference between this place and a regular arcade (and this must be the only difference as, just like the arcades of old, the place is dark, has no air conditioning, and the people there are just as crazy about games as you are) is that you pay $15 up front, and all the machines are set to Free Play, meaning that if you walk in right when they open at 11am, you can stay there working your thumbs on Altered Beast or Paperboy or Burger Time or Mortal Kombat until 2am without having to fish out a single quarter from your pocket! It's beautiful. I don't exactly remember how long we were in there, but it wasn't nearly long enough--they have more than 200 games, and they are always adding more and currently working on adding a pinball expansion. There was no way I even scratched the surface today and I am most certainly going back.

Great day, no? One of the best days I have had recently. The problem is I have a midterm to look forward to on Thursday, and I have homework due tomorrow evening and I still haven't watched the 3 1/2 hour lecture to get ready to do the homework, not to mention errands and the like. Ugh, and I have to find time to eat, too! So I have a lot to do tomorrow, and it has been nagging at me all day. Right now I am promising myself that I will get everything done tomorrow that I need to, but who knows if my promise holds up? I can usually keep my promises to other people, but the ones I make to myself are the ones most likely to be broken.

I think today would have been much better if I had gotten some of my work done over the weekend, but what can you do? In its essence I had a fantastic day, and I need to learn to be better at managing my time during the summer. I am sure I am not alone when I say that during the summer it is much harder to get things done that need to be done than it is during the semester. And since online classes almost seem abstract in that you are not in a classroom it's much harder to stay motivated and keep on top of your assignments. Here's hoping I can get things in gear tomorrow. I want to get back to the Galloping Ghost, but I want to do so without anything hanging over my head. I still haven't played Funhouse yet!

As horrifying as this may look, this happens to be my favorite
pinball machine of all time. I used to play this one all the
time in my uncle's basment when I was a kid.

Song of the Day

Rush 'N Attack OST - Level 1

Summer Classes

So school got out a few weeks ago, right? I am not imagining things. But the last time I checked I was still taking a class in Structural Design. OH WAIT, I am taking a summer class. My mistake. Ugh.

Your average summer class probably won't be this intense. Though

there might still be a chance for that romance bit. Or blood if

you get a pretty nasty paper cut.

In all honesty, summer classes aren't all that bad. I actually prefer them to the usual semester-long versions. Last year I took a class and an IPRO while I worked some hours at the office. Not too bad, and I compressed a whole semester of IPRO into something like eight weeks. Not too shabby, eh? The only downside to a summer class is, well, the fact that it is a class. In the summer. Woot.

Fortunately for me, though, the class that I am taking, CAE 303, has an online format. So instead of travelling two hours to get to class (or even travelling twenty minutes to the Wheaton campus to watch a class beamed live on a TV screen) I can watch lectures whenever I have time, and scan in my homework assignments when they're due. And all from the comfort of my own cave/bedroom!

One of the things I don't particulary like about summer classes is how they lengthen classes to three-ish hours twice a week or more so you finish in the compressed time slot. I am not that great at paying attention for that long. With an online class, I can watch a lecture in hour or half-hour increments so I can spread things out, give myself a chance to pay attention, and maybe play some Pokemon Yellow in between!

Also, my professor does a really good job at going through example problems in class. He'll post the homework assignment not too long before the class starts, so I will have a shot at attempting the problems before the taped lecture gets posted online the day after. And when it does, I can fast-forward or backtrack to get the most out of the example problems, essentially working on my homework during class.

This has nothing to do with anything, but it came up

on Google when I searched "summer school."

So while class may be long, I can stretch it out to less than two hours a weekday plus homework. That means I still have time during the summer to, say, get another job or see The Avengers for the twelfth time (slight exaggeration). Or maybe see that family I hear so much about. The possibilities are endless!

Finals Finished (Finally!)

Okay, so you know how at the end of every semester, someone always says "Wow! Time just flew by this semester!" Well, this semester time was flying an SR-71 Blackbird and the only thing I noticed was the sonic boom. Now finals week over and I am having a hard time remembering what happened this semester--and summer classes start tomorrow!

This semester has been my easiest semester so far. Because of a hiccup in my schedule I only had 15 credit hours, and two of them were classes I could sleep through and still pull off an A. So it hasn't been too bad. Of course, next semester will be a kick in the pants, but I'm going to keep my happy-go-lucky attitude until I move back in to the fraternity house August 15th (how awful is it that my birthday is also the day I have to go back to school and remind myself that the future will be bringing me nothing but pain for the next few months? Pretty darn.).

But, of course, that didn't stop finals from being a pain in the neck. My first final was on Monday morning, and by the end of it I felt like my mind had already checked out for the summer. And this was an open-book, open-note, open-Internet final. How was I going to get through a regular exam? I didn't know, but I must've done something right for the rest of them, because I felt really good the week after when I got to see my final grades.

Finals Week.

It has also been the semester I have been the most productive. No one has ever told me how to study, and I have had to figure that out all by myself. While I still haven't quite gotten the knack for it yet, I have solved one problem: remembering to do my homework. I have the hardest time remembering what projects are do when, and there always seems to be one class where I can never remember to do the homework. In high school it was usually a science class, and at IIT it happens to be one random class every semester. The Office of Campus Life hands out free planners every year so I technically have the means to remember everything, but after a week or two of that my planner mysteriously finds its was behind my desk, never to return.

I have since then now found a way to keep track of all my homework, and it seems to be working pulchritudinously. A while back a link from a website brought me to Schooltraq, which is still in beta. It's essentially an online assignment book that lets you add and edit assignments by class and they are organized by due date. Nothing too exciting, except when I made it my browser homepage suddenly I started remembering to do my homework. It also has this neat "focus mode" that will display one assignment on the screen and a blank page. I will hit "full screen" and unless I have an insatiable urge to see what LOL's are to be found on Somuchpun.com there really isn't anything to distract me. I introduced my little sister to it a couple months ago and she says it's helping her too.

Something as simple as a browser-based assignment book can be a huge difference.

The main benefit of this site is that now that I am remembering to do homework, studying is getting easier. When you do the homework, for some reason you tend to know the material better and then studying isn't so bad. Weird.

This site also had a strange effect on me. Since I saw my assignments more often, I would be more likely to do the assignments before they were due. I found myself doing my homework a week before they were due just so I could enjoy the satisfaction of clicking the check mark and moving an assignment to the "done" pile. And then. AND THEN. I was able to relax after that. Relax like I have never relaxed before. I would have nothing hanging over my head. Nothing to bug me all weekend. Nothing to dread working on at the last minute Sunday night. I could just sit back and watch old episodes of Mystery Science Theater 3000 until my eyes bled. It is an incredibly wonderful feeling.

I really don't want to say this. But. I think I have a lesson to take from this semester. So if you don't like hearing the moral of the story, please stop now. Now that I have had a taste of what true time management feels like, I don't want to stop. So, advice time! Figure out what time management strategies work for you, and figure it out now! Because when you start college, it's going to be this fantastic and new and hella-hard environment, and if you are not prepared for it, woe to you. If you come to IIT (or wherever you might be headed, I won't judge!), all the better if you come already set to go with whatever helps you stay on top of your work, whether that be Schooltraq, or Post-It notes, or calendars, or a person strapped to your back shouting your assignments at you all hours of the day. If you have to find out what you need to do later, it won't be the end of the world, but when you do finally figure it out you will regret not finding it sooner. If you want some help with finding ideas for productivity, check out lifehacker. They have plenty.

Song of the Day

Gotye - Somebody That I Used to Know

Fraternity Life - Part Three - The Conference

A couple months ago (wow, was it really that long ago?) I had the opportunity to attend the AFLV conference in St Louis. The Association of Fraternal Leadership and Values is all about what the same suggests: to educate members of Greek organizations about how to live out values, and to train members to be more successful in recruitment, socialization, and other areas.

This is an annual conference, but somehow I hadn't heard about it at all until our president brought it up at one of our house meetings some time in December. The extent of the discussion of the conference at our chapter meeting was, "So there's this conference coming up next semester. It's pretty cool. Who wants to go?"

Well, I had nothing better to do, and I always wanted to go to a conference (I didn't really care what conference. You just get that feeling of "I am a grown-up businessman, darn it!" when you get to go to these things) so I raised my hand and just like that I am registered for this conference. Two members of every Greek chapter on campus got to go, making a total of twenty of us total.

The conference was a three-day experience. We left Thursday morning and came back Saturday afternoon. And from the moment we got there to the moment we left it was non-stop activity. I had no idea what to expect when I left owing mostly to the wonderful product description from our president, so I was excited and also nervous. What if this was a conference where I would have to--GASP--talk to people? I was understandably worried.

Conversing with strangers? THE HORROR.

But I went along with it anyways. Besides, by then I was on the bus to St. Louis and there wasn't much else I could do at that point. So five hours later we were at the hotel, and after a quick nap we headed over to the conference center. The first thing I thought when I sat down was that it looked just like a TED conference or something. Spotlights, huge screens, hundreds of people, all within a huge warehouse-sized conference space. It looked like they had gone all-out when all I was expecting was a small room with hotel chairs and overly excited guy with an ID badge around his neck. That was most definitely not the case, I realized.

Okay, so maybe it wasn't THIS extravagant, but this is what it felt like.

Every day during the conference you had the choice of attending four or five presentations out of a list of over a hundred; the benefit of this was that you were almost guaranteed to be sure you were attending something that interested you. I checked out talks on hazing, several seminars on recruitment, and even one about relieving stress, just to name a few. All of these talks were designed to help members of fraternities and sororities reach their fullest potential in all aspects of their organization.

The best part, I think, of the conference wasn't necessarily all of the great presentations, or the step competition, or even the fact that I was in a new city I had never visited before. It was lunch on our first full day. Friday was a special luncheon, wherein you were to sit with members of your fraternity or sorority. If you were a member of a local group (meaning that your chapter is the only one in the country, like Zeta Pi Omega or Kappa Phi Delta, which are sororities unique to IIT) you got to sit with your fellow chapter members and meet people from other locals. If you were a member of a national fraternity or sorority, you were to sit at a table designated for your group.

Now, I have never been to a conference dedicated to my fraternity, so I had never had to opportunity to meet brothers from outside IIT. It was definitely a strange experience. I would almost compare it to meeting your distant relatives for the first time. You've never met them before, but it's almost uncanny how well you know these people because of how similar they are to you, that-one-crazy-aunt-you-don't-talk-to-anymore excluded. It was probably the most fun I had that weekend, especially when we all broke out singing some of our fraternity songs in the middle of the luncheon (which, honestly, wasn't that out of place, considering some fraternities have chants they'll shout at random intervals and there's this one sorority that has this ear-bleeding screech).

It was a reminder to me that this strange experience called "Fraternity Life" isn't something unique to someone like me. This is something that happens all over the country, and it was amazing to meet people who, like myself, weren't too hot on the idea of going Greek, and then found themselves not only enjoying being a part of a fraternity, but being a part of Alpha Sigma Phi. "Inspiring" is totally the wrong word to use here, but maybe something short of pride would fit better.

By the end of the weekend I had made three or four new friends (two of whom were from IIT. Who knew?) and we came out of it not just with a canvas bag filled with Greek schwag (a trucker hat, a color-changing cup, sunglasses, and about enough paper to choke a copy machine) but a huge reminder that while we might be from different fraternities we are still all a collection of men and women who live by their values and support one another. Gee, that sound an awful lot like the last two blog entries I wrote... On the plus side, this ends my commentary on Fraternity life for now. Hopefully the next time I am inspired to grace the internet with my prose it will be for something completely different. Or interesting. Interesting would be good.

Song of the Day

LCD Soundsystem - Dance Yrself Clean

Featuring the Muppets

Fraternity Life - Part Two

Okay, so maybe deciding to end on a cliffhanger was kind of stupid considering this is just a blog, but I didn't exactly want to make my post the length of a novel, and considering how short attention spans are nowadays I wasn't exactly sure anyone could even finish the last one. And so here I am, ready to tie up loose ends. Here we go!

*ahem*

And thus I joined the fraternity.

The End.

*credits*

There, now wasn't that a great story? No? Well, I tried. Actually the rushing process was something that required my own involvement and interaction, so the fact that I made it all the way through pledging means that somewhere along the lines I actually realized I enjoyed being part of a fraternity and wanted to join.

"Pledging," for those not in the loop, is the process by which the new prospects, or pledges (or "pledgelings", if you are weird like me) are put through a "fraternization" program, if you will. They are educated in the ways of the fraternity: their values, history, and members, to name a few. "Rushing" is the activity of bringing new people into the fraternity.

The longer I spent at the fraternity house the more I had to rethink my ideas of what a fraternity is. A fraternity is not a group of guys who pop their polo collars, throw parties, get wasted, and wake up with their heads in the toilet. And this is contrary to everything I thought a fraternity was. What I thought was all about partying and shenanigans turned out to be a collection of men who strove to live their lives by their values, and be gentlemen. And while at times we can and will act like hooligans (and who wouldn't want to at least some of the time?) the people I now know as my brothers are individuals who are committed to being the best they can be. Most of the time.

This can be a number of things. We try our darnedest to excel academically. We treat people with respect. We listen. We think. We support our brothers, and anyone else. We are most certainly not what you see on TV. Unless you are watching some PBS special on how great fraternities are. In that case, yes, we are definitely like the ones you see on television.

The process of pledging can be kind of scary at times. The brothers tell us they don't haze (and they better not; it's against the rules of the school and probably against the law too) but I always had a voice in the back of my head not to trust anybody if there is a chance of hazing. To get every brother's signature on our pledge paddle (nothing actually gets paddled, it's just a tradition that we have them) we have to do something for them, and more often than not it was to either help them with a chore or just to hang out with them for a while. Nothing painful, nothing embarrassing, nothing evil. Just some good-natured stuff. After it was over I wondered why I worried about it so much.

Parents today spend so much time warning their children about fraternities and how horrible they are when they are preparing to head off to college, and then when you find out what they are really like you furrow your brow in confusion. How did this wrong idea begin? Some fraternities my be trouble, and that will probably not go away--and some more serious incidents at other schools might have had a place in the development of the fraternal stereotype. But the truth is, movies have this tendency to create and perpetuate false stereotypes, and these stereotypes somehow become a cultural fact (and websites dedicated to drunken fraternal follies do not help either). Our job as fraternity men is to prove them all wrong and to instead create and perpetuate brotherhood. And that is what we do.

I am proud to be an Alpha Sig.

Song of the Day

The Avalanches - Frontier Psychiatrist

Fraternity Life - Part One

A few weeks ago I had the pleasure to be part of a group of IIT students from the Greek community to go to St Louis for the annual AFLV conference. The Association of Fraternal Leadership and Values gathers hundreds of students from all across the country every year to discuss, entertain, and educate fraternity men and sorority women about what it means to be Greek, and how best to approach different aspects of Greek life, whether it be recruitment, perceptions of Greek life, and even stress management.

But before I get into all of that, I should maybe talk about how I got into Greek life in the first place.

Back when I was a young naive freshman, I had the same idea of fraternity life as anyone else graduating from high school did. Specifically, the idea of the "Animal House" fraternity. Or the "Old School" fraternity. Or any of the countless other fraternities or sororities portrayed on television or in the movies. Growing up with these ideas of what a "frat" should be, I knew I wanted to stay as far away from fraternities as I possibly could. The drinking! The shenanigans! The illegal recreation! The horror! It was the last thing I wanted to be a part of.

Don't lie. You know this is who you think of when you think "fraternity."

Of course, that doesn't stop everyone from joining, and our Greek community is fairly large. And I had no idea why. If that was what fraternities were about, why were so many people joining?

Well, I pushed it out of my mind for a long time, and it wasn't until the second semester of my second year where things started to change. After my year in the Architecture program, I made a lot of architecture friends, and even after I became a "traitor" and moved to the ArchE department I kept many of those. One of them was my roommate, Adam. We were both normal guys, and I really didn't think he would be one of "those guys" to join a fraternity. Well, that semester he had started hanging out somewhere and wouldn't come back to our room until later than usual, and being me, I didn't bother to ask where he was spending his time. He was an Archie, and I chalked it up to him being busy with projects and whatnot.

One day I was feeling a bit down-and-out for whatever reason and I decided to make some dinner (one of those tiny mac & cheese in a cup things) and curl up with a nice feel-good movie, The Shining (I don't know what I was thinking either). "All by yourself watching a horror movie? Wow, Tony, that is sad," I hear you say. And yes. Yes it is. But let's get beyond that, shall we? Let's.

So I was just about to get to the good part of the movie where things really heat up, when my door opens and the lights flick on. There were Adam and our friend Eric, just back from dinner.

"Wanna come to Huck's with us, Tony?" one of them said.

"Huh?" was my reply.

Huck Finn's is a 24-hr breakfast joint outside of downtown Chicago, and considering I had nothing better to do (finishing my movie couldn't hold a candle to real food), I figured I would agree and join the two of them. They just had to make a pit-stop back at the house to drop off Eric's stuff.

The house? I thought. What is he talking about? I'm hungry.


So I grabbed my jacket and we head out.

To the Quad.

Uh-oh.

Frightening, isn't it?

The Quad is where all of the Greek houses are located on campus. And we were heading straight for it. I was a bit uneasy. Were we going to a "frat?" I didn't realize until then that Eric was a member of a fraternity, and we were stopping by the chapter house to pick up a couple more guys before we left.

So we get there, and the first thing I notice was that everyone was sober. No one was running around half-naked. No one was lying on the couch in a drunken stupor. In fact, the only people I saw were a couple guys playing pool one room over. And they looked normal. I was understandably confused.

In the process of waiting, I ended up shaking hands with almost half of the house as they were coming back from whatever it was they were out doing. It was a strange experience for me. Eric's two "brothers" made it back to the house, and we all piled into a car and set out for Huck's.

I have never seen this place in daylight. Eating there between 6am-9pm is just wrong.

Now I am not going to go into details, mostly because by now this story is already getting pretty boring (don't lie to me, you know it's true--if you made it this far, isn't there something more important you could be doing?), but the important thing to note here is that I had a really good time. Sometimes there is just that moment where you realize that you are having too much fun to care that just ten minutes ago you were worried that these "frat bros" were going to go crazy and/or get a bit weird. It was an incredibly mellow trip to the diner, and I had more than my share of laughs.

Got back to the chapter house, and I went home without a second thought. They might have been fun, but I wasn't going to be coming back any time soon. And I had to finish that movie.

Next day. Afternoon. Dorm room. I was working on homework like a good little college student, and Adam comes into the room with a (somewhat exaggerated) confused look on his face.

"So, uh, Tony." He said, smiling. "You....have a bid?" He handed me a folded up piece of paper he produced from his pocket.

"What does that mean?"

"You got in."

"...To what?"

"The fraternity."

"...What?"

What?

What's this? Our second-semester student sucked slyly into some seemingly sinister situation? Set to stew in the soup of social uncertainty? Find out next week! Same bat-time! Same bat-channel!

Song of the Day:
Andrew Bird - Eyeoneye

Almost-But-Not-Quite Spring Break

One week left until Spring Break. And while I am understandably exhausted from the first half of the semester, I can't say I am as desperate to go on break as I have been in the past.

This semester is only fifteen credit hours, and one of them happens to be a lower-level sociology course, so all in all my schedule is fairly light. Not that I am complaining--far from it. It was wonderful to have a semester where I could have time for extracurriculars and friends. It was great to give myself a greater opportunity to raise my GPA. I just wish I could have done more.

But being the in-the-moment guy I am, I am extremely happy to already be done with my midterms. I know most of my friends are still struggling through midterms and still will be slogging though the academic heckscape next week. I on the other hand, have been finished with midterm exams for almost two weeks now. I am extremely lucky. That means I can devote some more of my time to my organizations and my fraternity.

Initiation for our fraternity is this weekend, so there is preparation work that needs to be done for that. We are getting things ready even now so the big day can go without a hitch. Saturday will be especially busy because in the morning I have the pleasure of working a Saturday Visit down at the office. For those of you who aren't aware, several times during the semester the Undergrad Admissions office is open on Saturday for students who can't make it to campus during the week. I will be giving a tour and there will be a presentation on academics and student life.

Also that day I have errands to run and then initiation which takes the better part of the evening. And then after that, I get to go to a concert at 10pm. So a ridiculously busy day to be sure, but any day that caps off with a Jake Shimabukuro concert is a day worth having. Jake is one of the world's best ukulele players, and I am ecstatic I was able to nab tickets to the almost-sold-out show.

Bottom line: really busy week and weekend, but in all honesty, I wouldn't have it any other way. Bring it on, weekend! I am ready!

Song of the Day

Jake Shimabukuro - Third Stream