37 Comments
While you despair/rejoice/fret over your housing number, some other news to take your mind off singles and square feet: the “Study Day Project” has been resolved! Presumptive CCSC President Sue Yang filled Bwog in on the details:
- Registrar John Carter and Brady Sloan have determined that there will be 2 study days next semester: Tuesday, December 15, and Wednesday, December 16, (as opposed to just Tuesday December 15).
- Why isn’t the last Monday of classes cancelled? “New York State Law prevents us from canceling the final Monday of classes; it requires a certain number of Mondays, Tuesdays, etc. of classes every semester.”
- “Exams are being shifted around to accommodate this change,” and “measures will be taken to ensure that future conflict does not arise over this issue.”
- Yang also told Bwog, “I think the Study Day issue and its resolution are a good model of how council can facilitate interactions between students and administrative bodies to bring students the change they want to see,” and insisted on giving a shout-out the Committee on Instruction’s Student Representatives, Yiliu Shen-Burke and Brendan Price.
In case you didn’t already figure the symbolism out, New York State Law = “the man.”
The effect: the exam period will run from Thursday (the 17th) to Wednesday (the 23rd), with Saturday and Sunday still off, and there will just be more exams within those four days. You may now continue with plans to skip your last Monday class.
– JCD
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37 Comments
@Just 2 Things... First, Sue Yang is amazing – at least she got us an additional day. Getting this pigheaded administration to bend on anything substantive is a miracle.
Second, obviously two study days is not even close to adequate. I’m not really sure what they were smoking when they composed the schedule… Seriously Columbia, wtf?
@I think We should hunger strike for more study days.
@why do you have to call me an idiot for pointing out the reality of this terrible bureaucratic mess?
neither the new york state board of regents, nor the middle states commission on higher education would penalize any institution for a schedule change. it should be noted: cornell, princeton, upenn, nyu – they are also accredited by the middle states association. what do their study periods look like? at this point, when the semester hasn’t even begun, a “cancellation” is not what we’re talking about – it’s a change in schedule. and even if it were a cancellation, why would it be illegal? professors do it all the time.
someone should email the new york state commissioner and ask him how his office would officially react to this schedule change.
i bet he has better things to do than worry about it.
it’s bizarre that the amount of time and effort that sue yang put into this change probably far exceeds one 24 hour period of an extra study day. it’s either really selfless or really stupid.
@the law Incidentally, I believe it is also against the law to allow a donkey to sleep in your bathtub in Brooklyn (http://www.programimi.com/2008/04/02/strange-but-true-laws-in-new-york/)
@'09 I’m a senior, and while I’m not certain that Columbia is particularly less helpful to students than Harvard, Yale, or Princeton– Princeton case in point with the strict 33% quotas for A grades– I share the outrage. The idea that adding one day makes any particular difference is plain stupid. That said, perhaps some professors will schedule weekend exams. It’s not unheard of and can be quite helpful.
@Fucking Shit! I don’t give a fuck about the study days. I usually say I’m gonna study, then I just end up getting drunk all week. The real problem is that the last exam is the day before Xmas Eve. For those of us who do not live in the Northeast, we have to worry about expensive flights. Flights are twice as expensive on the 22 and 23. FUCK U CU
@Yiliu Shen-Burke is amazing.
@sue yang i don’t even know if it’s necessary to say something nice about sue yang, because anyone who knows her knows she’s effective and amazing. all of these negative bwog commenters probably fail at life.
get ready for her presidency, it’ll prolly be the best in years
@sue yang is the hardest-working person here. she is doing what she sees as the best for columbia students, and commenters who are shitting on her are clearly just attention whores. get over yourselves and thank sue for putting forth a tremendous effort to change the university schedule. do you have ANY idea how hard it is to navigate the bureaucracy AND ACTUALLY SUCCEED in having the university bend?
@NYS Law? I’m pretty sure Columbia is guilty of violating a few dozen of them already.
@why are people complaining about this?
@seriously You all need the get the incredible amount of sand out of your collective vaginas.
I’m a junior and an engineering major so STFU people like #18 and #15 with your senses of entitlement. Grow the fuck up and be glad you have two days instead of 1.
Also, I don’t know Sue Yang but given the trustworthiness of the average commenter on Bwog I’m willing to bet she is a lovely person.
@Jesus Christ shut your fucking face you fucking charlatan. engineers don’t deserve a say.
@engineer Dare I ask why?
@well mostly because you are not important.
@Yuck Damnit. I always, always, always get the last exam period, so I was really hoping that whatever solution the councils dreamed up would involve the last day of exams NOT being the day before Christmas Eve.
@thanks Yiliu! you’ve saved us all! plus you’re mega hottt
@woah... Chill out people. The amount of wrath this post has summoned is a bit frightening. Just start studying ahead of time; short and more frequent study sessions over a period of a few weeks is FAR more beneficial than trying to cram it all in and pulling all nighters during the reading week (or days, as the case may be).
@jon are you an american studies major? do you even go to college? do you have any idea about what butler is like during finals week?
@academic calendars let’s take a look at this spring, let alone next fall
princeton’s reading week: may 5-13 (8 days)
harvard’s reading week: may 2-13 (12 days)
yale’s reading week: april 27-may 5 (9 days)
…
columbia’s reading DAYS: may 5-7 (3 days)
wtf is wrong with you columbia?
—
http://registrar.princeton.edu/academic-calendar/acad1s.pdf
http://www.registrar.fas.harvard.edu/fasro/common/calendar.jsp
http://www.yale.edu/yalecollege/academics/calendar/index.html
http://www.columbia.edu/cu/registrar/docs/students/academic-calendar/index.html
@AHHHHHHHHHHHHH GOD DAMN SHIT PISSS CUNT FUCK MOTHERFUCKING TWAT OF MORMON TURTLE EATING DINGLEFRUIT.
this is such fucking bull shit.
@seriously this is bull shit. can someone actually point to this bull shit new york law? certain number of mondays? give me a fucking break. more than any other school, columbia should have several reading days… especially given that between core classes, we have on average more reading than almost any other college in america (save places like st. john’s who do nothing but read).
moreover i’d like to point out that harvard has a fucking week, princeton has a fucking week, yale has a fucking week. WHAT THE FUCK COLUMBIA, WE HAVE TWO DAYS??? SERIOUS WHAT THE FUCK IS WRONG WITH YOU.
@what prosecutor on earth would concern itself with a private college’s class schedule?
someone needs to do some fact checking also on this so-called “law” – i doubt its existence or its applicability to a private university.
@The applicability would be a loss of accreditation.
@so... you’re saying that columbia SHOULD have willingly violated state law?
geez…
@what prosecutor no, im saying i doubt this law exists.
and since i searched the new york law code for the word “monday” and got no results in education law, i still don’t think it exists.
new york state is not what gives columbia its accreditation. http://www.msche.org/
@i.e. sue yang and/or the administration are lying
@yeah But why can Columbia give out degrees in the first place?
“No institution in this State shall confer any honorary or other degree unless so authorized by its charter or by authorization of the Regents…. The commissioner shall make regulations for the conferring of degrees, and no institution shall confer a degree except in accordance with such regulations…”
8 NYCRR 3.46
@are you a complete idiot? if the school doesnt follow the state education laws, the people that do give us accreditation can deny us that privilege.
@Senior Sucks to be all of you.
@Haha Yeah, if I weren’t graduating I’d be kind of pissed that exams are now much more likely to be on the same day, which is worse for studying than a lack of continuous study days. Having more days in a row rarely leads to more studying; rather this favors people with long papers to write (where blocked time is at a premium) over people who have a lot of finals (where near-term preparation is advantaged). Basically, this little crusade handed English majors a gift at the expense of, say, math majors.
@#1, 3, and 4 quit bitching and say thank you. jeez…
@Angry Black Man “I think the Study Day issue and its resolution are a good model of how council can facilitate interactions between students and administrative bodies to bring students the change they want to see,”
BITCH YOU AINT OBAMA!YOU ONLY GOT US AN EXTRA DAY?!
@not black but i agree with you.
@Yiliu Shen-Burke is a god
@sue yang self aggrandizing bitch with an ego to match her big belly
@agreed bitch without apology, glad she got an entire day added to our study period. now our problem is solved because we have pluralized the original issue.