<p>Larry Benedict, the MIT dean for student life, was once quoted in The Tech as follows:
That rings true for me – I had a few truly stupidly intense terms, terms where I should have known better than to try to balance all of the things I had on my plate. And the experience during those terms, particularly at midterm week and the last week of classes, was something like trying to tread water for several hours while balancing an encyclopedia on my head. But the sense of accomplishment at the end of those terms was profound enough and rewarding enough that I did it several times, and that I look back at those terms as being very character-building.</p>