Taking a class because you love it vs. for the grade?

Wordworker
Sat, 09 Apr 2011 16:38:35 +0000

During my senior year in a small, mediocre high school, I made two unconventional choices.

In the fall, I took a one-semester course, required, in “problems of democracy.” Instead of using the boring textbook, we read and discussed Newsweek. I loved it. During the spring semester, I had an open period and didn’t want to take another study hall. So I went to the teacher and the counselor and asked whether they’d let me take the class again, this time as an auditor. I certainly didn’t need the credit. Probably nobody ever had made a request like this, but they agreed, since the work would be different in another term (unless Newsweek unexpectedly reprinted whole issues).

I also had a class rank issue. I was at the top and had run out of things to take, so I registered for a full year of shorthand in the business department, rather than the one-semester notehand class for college-bound students. I had to fight to get in, because nobody ever had wanted to do it, but I’d found out that kids who took the shorter course didn’t end up using it afterwards. Then I almost regretted that I’d gotten in, because it was harder than any of my academic classes, and I almost lost my rank. But I really worked, ultimately pulled out an A, kept my top rank, and write this as a Penn graduate whose unorthodox senior schedule didn’t preclude her admission.

If you could audit the class, you would get access to the material and a chance to show Penn that you actually have an intellectual interest. (Yeah, colleges tend to like that. They get so many applications from kids who take cookie-cutter schedules and end up sounding alike.)