<p>Anybody have any thoughts on the spate of House Masters resignations?
[Mather</a> House Masters To Step Down | The Harvard Crimson](<a href=“http://www.thecrimson.com/article/2009/12/7/mather-house-masters-to-step-down/]Mather”>Mather House Masters To Step Down | News | The Harvard Crimson)</p>
<p>My thought is this has to do with the financial situation at H. I’m sure their budgets have been cut.</p>
<p>OK, I am actually embarrassed to ask this question but does anyone have suggestions for good (ie good work and reasonable price) manicure/pedicure places in Cambridge. D is doing ballroom team’s three day intensive dance camp this week. Last night she made a comment about how “her feet are trashed”. Thought maybe a mani/pedi might be a nice pick-me-up after getting through her first final on Saturday. I tried Yahoo yellow pages and the list was huge. I thought there might be actual recommendations. Thanks :)</p>
<p>She might give a try to Pyara in Brattle Square. It would be close enough to her dorm.</p>
<p>I have not gone there myself, so she should google it. Yelp is a good site for reviews.</p>
<p>Marite - Thanks for the suggestion. I’ll check it out.</p>
<p>smoda,
I took D to Pyara for an eyebrow wax. Nice atmosphere, very convenient. Here is their website with prices: [PYARA</a> Spa and Salon | 617 / 497.9300 | AVEDA lifestyle salon](<a href=“http://www.pyaraaveda.com/]PYARA”>http://www.pyaraaveda.com/)</p>
<p>Thanks for the confirmation. Looking up Pyara on Yelp provided some reviews on it and caused me to read info on two other salons. At least I’ll be prepared when she has the energy enough to call me. I know I can always count on fellow CCers. :)</p>
<p>^ Good luck getting her to keep an appointment. Son has not had a hair-cut since August despite lots of attempts. There just never seems to be time and meanwhile he’s getting pretty hairy. Cutting the hair, doing the laundry. Just not happening this year.</p>
<p>^ If she wants it then it will not be a problem. I got her one back in Oct but had to drive her to our home town to do it. Her parting words after were something about pedicures and how they help her study. I’ll talk with her when she has a free moment.</p>
<p>Mine has not had a haircut since August, either. I tried to get him to go to a barber when he was home for Thanksgiving, but either he was sleeping in or being busy. Next try is next week when he comes home for Xmas!</p>
<p>lol - Marite, let me know if you have any strategies in mind. Not only does the hair not get cut but neither does it seem to get combed . . .</p>
<p>ha ha! We didn’t bring our son home this year for Thanksgiving, but we did notice he had a haircut when we skyped him. He said it was because he was going to spend Thanksgiving with his girlfriends family and didn’t want to look scruffy 
- it doesn’t matter why, it’s just cut!</p>
<p>I just spoke with DD who said that she absolutely dislikes the new exam schedule. She said that she much preferred coming back after the holidays for final exams. I would have thought that she would have liked the new schedule - there is a lot to be said for not having to worry about exams while enjoying the holiday break.</p>
<p>Have any parents heard the same thing from their DD/DS? Any students care to comment on the new schedule?</p>
<p>My daughter seems to like the new schedule … I certainly do!</p>
<p>Personally I was glad that my daughter never had the other schedule. I remember from my college days that my exams were before the holiday break (Duke), while my sister’s (Princeton) were after. In the process, I was able to do two brief winter internships while my Princeton sister continued to study. For my daughter this year, she is going to be working a couple 40 hour weeks and weekends as a ski coach which would be a mistake for her to do if she had her finals after break.</p>
<p>The only thing she/we found difficult is not the fault of the school. She joined the ballroom team and had a Columbia competition Dec 4-5 and then an intensive 3 day dance camp Dec 8-10, with her final expos paper due the 11th and first dreaded final on the 12th. She had very little sleep and was in tough shape yesterday but sounds good today. She now has a week until her second final with the last one two days behind.</p>
<p>I’m a senior, and I really, really preferred the old schedule. A couple of reasons:</p>
<p>1) It gives you a chance to relax before finals- studying is stressful enough, and was much worse when it came right off of a busy November of work.</p>
<p>2) It split up our break into two segments- winter break and intercession. This is far preferable to one long intercession. (If I had to give an explanation, I’d refer to the law of diminishing returns, but I think many here will agree).</p>
<p>3) The idea of not having to worry about exams over the break, in my opinion, is overrated. In the three years I’ve had the old schedule I’ve never actually worried about exams over the break. You get at least a week and a half of reading period when you get back (and if your exams happen to start late, you get more), and the average college student is enough of a procrastinator that he would never start studying with two or three empty weeks ahead of him.</p>
<p>4) HOWEVER, if there actually is a test that requires a LOT of studying, so much that it couldn’t fit into reading period, it’s much better to have the time over vacation than not to have it at all!</p>
<p>5) Courses with projects used often to have them due after the break, meaning that
students had a chance to work on them over vacation along with reading period. The new schedule wreaks havoc with such schedules, since the projects now conflict with course schedules and time to study for other exams. This is really noticeable in CS 50, of which I’m a TF- students were much, much more stressed out about the project, and projects were generally somewhat smaller, than has been true in the last few years. </p>
<p>Those are some of the reasons I preferred the old schedule, but I admit the new schedule certainly has its advantages:</p>
<p>1) Since I have at one more final, I’ve never technically experienced the new kind of break. Maybe I’ll like it more than I expect!</p>
<p>2) I like that it starts earlier in September- I was always kind of bummed at the end of the summer when all of my friends were going back to college.</p>
<p>3) Having a ~5 week long break can be more productive if you actually have an internship or job during that time. I myself will be continuing my thesis.</p>
<p>Admiral - Interesting observations. Thanks</p>
<p>With the new schedule, there is still spring break, but no similar fall break (Thanksgiving does not really count).
I’ve heard that graduate students in writing heavy disciplines are hugely stressed, having had to produce 3-4 long papers by last Friday while still taking classes until Dec. 4. I don’t know how grad students at other universities manage. Maybe undergrads in writing-heavy disciplines have also felt stressed? Did profs adjust their expectations of the term papers according to the new schedule?</p>
<p>My D prefers the old schedule for all of the reasons Admiral gave.</p>
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<p>One thing I will point out is that this is not exactly unprecedented, since the schedule in the spring has always had classes, then reading period, then exams, without a two week break in the middle. I will note that I have always found spring exams much harder than fall exams, partly for this reason.</p>