At AU, as at any college, students come from all walks of life, and thus have different ways of behaving in class. Certain types of students, however, are so common that they can be found in every class. Here are the five most common as found on AU’s campus:
1. The One Who Never Shuts Up
AU is home to students who tend to be highly involved in various activities and who are driven academically. This often means students have defined opinions on everything under the sun. Sometimes, these opinions can be highly interesting and create an environment for debate. However, in every AU class, there is always that one student that will take sharing their thoughts to new heights, and will make sure to share with the class their feelings on every possible subject. This involves raising his or her hand to answer any and every question, even those that are rhetorical. His or her answers will often stretch over two minutes long (although it may feel more like days), and by the end, even the professor will have stopped pretending they’re listening. The only reason anyone in the class will like them is that because of this student, no one else will have to answer the questions, since this student will take up half of class time listening to themselves speak. After the class is over, remember to add this student to the list of people to avoid, right up next to former friends and drunken hookups.
2. The Notetaker
This is the student who comes to class with at least two notebooks, a laptop, and copious amounts of pens and pencils each day. It will be difficult to interact with them in class, since their eyes will most likely be glued to the screen the whole time, writing every slide down word for word, regardless even if the slideshow is posted on Blackboard. He or she will be the one who, come finals, will have a 10 page review guide, detailing every word that came out of the professor’s mouth on each subject covered. Like it or not, this student will be the most prepared, and will put everyone else to shame. However, if other students take the time to make friends with the Notetaker, perhaps there can be a silver lining for them in the form of the perfect tutor.
3. The Sleep-Deprived Student
Often, this student will have been up all night writing a paper for the class after this one, or, more likely, watching Netflix until 2 AM. Whatever the case, this student will then decide to take one of two routes in class: One, he or she will completely surrender and tip their head back to go to sleep for the duration of the lesson. The second option, and the more common road taken, is that he or she will desperately attempt to stay awake, sipping on an overpriced Mudbox coffee and attempting to concentrate. While this may mean that this student won’t go to sleep fully, they will then start taking what will be termed “mini-naps.” These naps are involuntary on the part of the student, and involve closing the eyes and slightly drooling for a few minutes until a loud voice or a light turned on forces the student out of this state of semi-conciousness. Don’t worry, we’ve all been there. It’s college, it happens.
4. The One Who Only Shows Up for Exams
Another name for this student could be “the ghost,” since his or her peers will question who this student during his or her rare appearances in class. He or she will often live off campus, and/or hold an internship or job and feel like they don’t have time for class. This student is most often seen in larger GenEd classes in which the professor is so overwhelmed with students already, an abscence or two won’t matter. Sure, this student is basically throwing a couple thousand dollars off a cliff, but hey, sometimes it’s just too difficult to get out of bed to recieve an education that literally billions would kill for. Just saying.
5. The One With the Laptop
In some ways, this student is the same as #4, only in this case, the student in question is physically in class. Whether they are mentally there, as they watch a live soccer game or scroll through Facebook, is what is highly questionable. This student will have mastered the art of periodically looking up at the professor and nodding in order to seem like they are understanding the lecture, even if all they are understanding is Beyonce playing on Spotify through their headphones. He or she will often sit in an area where students sitting behind them can see exactly what they are doing, and then distract all of these students for the rest of class. He or she can also be found having a silent nervous breakdown in the library the night before the final. Hey, maybe they should become friends with The Notetaker.