The course schedule for each semester almost always looks the same as the previous. Some classes get rearranged within the week, some are only offered in the spring or fall, some get taught by different professors. For the most part, though, our options for selecting courses are a stagnant, monotonous hell. If our dear registrar Angie Dewberry is open to suggestions, here are some classes I think the student body would want to see:
Theory of Fantasy Football – Math
If you’ve ever participated in a Fantasy Football league, you already know it’s pretty much the equivalent of a fifth class. You’ve got to rearrange your roster, make trades, bench injured players, draft well (this season I played the first week without a quarterback – Johnny Manziel was a silly choice for a backup). This is my first season playing, and I certainly underestimated the amount of research and strategy that goes into success. The math department could offer a Fantasy Football class that’s all about statistics and opportunity costs and crushing your cousin’s team because he drafted Marshawn Lynch before you could.
A Whole Lot of Holes – English
Too many Young Adult novels fall from public consciousness after middle school. Louis Sachar’s Holes, in particular, is chock full of literary merit that goes unnoticed because it’s targeted at younger readers. If you think about it, the novel actually parallels One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest fairly closely. It’s got foreshadowing and figurative language out the wazoo. A seminar devoted to deconstructing this YA novel (or one or more of similar significance) would be hella nostalgic and hella fun.
History of Magic – History
Let’s be real – any history professor at Davidson would do a better job teaching the History of Magic than old ghostie Professor Binns. And it wouldn’t even have to be limited to Hogwarts! Start with the legend of Merlin and then study the Salem Witch Trials and mystical practices around the globe. End the semester with an in-depth look at the cultural significance of Harry Potter and his studies.
Mapping Imaginary Worlds – Political Science
Whenever the topic of cartography comes up, someone always asks the inevitable: “Hasn’t everything already sort of been discovered, though, by like, Magellan and Cortés? NASA, you know?” Those guys did a pretty good job, but they never mapped important fictional locales. From Narnia to Middle Earth to the Intergalactic Empire to Pawnee, Indiana, imaginary worlds deserve the same devotion to accurate depiction. Several weeks ago, a friend asked if my wall map of Westeros was “to scale,” and I couldn’t answer. Inconsistent understanding of space can lead to discrepancies in textual comprehension. We – and our texts – deserve better.
Sleep – Psychology
If there’s one thing most college students are bad at, it’s sleep. We stay up too late and get up too early, and our bodies and minds suffer for it. Sleeplessness affects hundreds of millions of people, and in most cases even science can’t adequately explain why. An in-depth study of personal sleep habits would make for a fabulous psychology course, complete with a weekly nap lab. Extra napping outside of class strongly encouraged.
Quilting – Studio Art
This class would be best taken before signing up for the Sleep lab so that you have your own cozy blanket to snuggle with. Davidson students have, as a general rule, too few creative outlets. We constantly produce work that has value for a semester, and then we get our grades back and our work is no longer relevant. Quilts last for generations if you’re halfway decent at it. And if you’re not, Grandma will love it anyway, professors’ marks be damned. Make her proud.
Food Science – Chemistry
Learn what makes yeast rise and why certain foods cook at certain temperatures. Or how stomach acid breaks down what you eat. Or why you need to put salt in cookie dough. Or why some people can’t smell asparagus pee. Regardless of the science, the point is that we need a class with a cooking/snacking lab just as much as we need a class with a napping lab. These are the important things in life.