School

With only 32 days left until Christmas, the holiday shopping season is quickly ramping up. Malls and shopping centers everywhere will soon be packed with frantic shoppers looking for the perfect gift for their friends and loved ones. But, what if one of one of those people is a student journalist? Finding gifts for an up-and-coming journalist needn’t be difficult.

Here are a few of my suggestions.

• Newspaper and magazine subscriptions Keeping up with the news is important for any journalism student, but few students can afford to pay $5.70 per week for the Toronto Star.
• Batteries Who doesn’t need batteries? Tape recorder, camera flash, MP3/CD player, need I say more?
• Camera accessories A journalist’s camera is an important part of his or her arsenal. Why not help them out a little bit? Flash units and lenses are out of many student’s price ranges, and smaller accessories like straps, batteries, and memory cards can help out a lot.
• Pens and pencils We’ve all heard that saying, “A new baby is born every minute.” Snap your fingers. A journalist just lost another pen.
• Notepads A journalist without a notepad is like a surgeon without a scalpel. They’ll still get the job done, but it could get messy. Palm-sized pads are best for field interviews, while normal sizes work great for phone interviews. Buy these in bulk.
• Tape recorder A good tape recorder is a valuable commodity for journalists. It can be used to record interviews in the field and over the phone, as well as for personal notes. Don’t bother with any model with built-in phone jacks. It’s cheaper to buy a normal model and purchase a telephone adapter and it provides the same recording quality.
• Deals on books Most bookstores offer gift certificates and book club memberships for relatively cheap prices. Chapters, for example, offers an iRewards membership for $25, allowing the member to receive as much as 40% off on some books.
• USB key Floppy disks are dead. Let your journalism student get portable with a handy USB key. Check out SanDisk for some good models.
• Backpack Camera, lenses, tape recorder, notepads, pens, pencils, research materials, binders, notebooks, laptop, and more. A good backpack will save a journalism student a lot of future back pain and suffering.
• Money and food What college student isn’t hurting for cash and ramen noodles?

Are there any other suggestions from you guys? Hit up the comments and let me know.

For this humble author, the hustle and bustle of college life has begun once again. Writing this post, seated semi-comfortably in the learning commons at Durham College, I find myself intrigued by many of my fellow students.

Some are obviously here for the first time, nervous and lost. Others appear more confident, unafraid, steady. It’s the same cross-section that is being witnessed on campuses all over the country this morning, as millions of students move into dorms, attend orientation, and begin their classes.

It’s hard to define where I fall in all of this. I’ve been to college before, I have the diploma to prove it. The stresses of orientation and classes are nothing new to me, almost old news. The campus at Durham feels just like the campus at Loyalist, only slightly bigger and more expensive.

It will be interesting to see how my perspective differs from the others in my program, to see if the extra two years of post-secondary experience has any impact on my learning. I have to admit, part of me is nervous as well, but not in that first-year student kind of way. This is a much more focused fear, more inward. Am I here for the right reasons? Is this a good program for me? Am I wasting my time? My money?

I can only hope, as the year goes on, I can answer those questions.

After a few brief moments of panic, unable to connect to the Durham College server, I am finally registered for all of my classes. Enrolled in the Web Developer program, the first semester is a hodge-podge of entry-level courses. The classes, along with my thoughts, are as follows.

Digital Imaging I (DIGI 1301 01)

After my experience working with digital photography at Loyalist College, I suspect this will be one of the easier classes in my schedule. Obviously there will be some difference between working on web graphics (headers, logos, etc.) and photographs meant for print, but my experience working with Photoshop gives me an advantage.

Communication Essentials (COMM 1337 01)

This is another class which will play right into my journalism experience. However, I am interested in seeing what sort of differences there will be between communicating with people through media like newspapers and magazines, and communicating through the web.

Mathematics for Computing (MATH 1309 03)

For every college student, there is one course which they come to fear the most. For me, Mathematics for Computing is that course. Throughout the years math has always been, by far, my worst subject. While it will be nice to have a challenge, I hope I can just make it through this one.

Extensible HTML (PROG 1300 03)

I taught myself HTML in elementary school. Nuff’ said.

Interface Design I (DESN 1306 02)

Along with Vector Graphics, this is one of the classes I am looking forward to the most. In designing each of my websites, figuring out the user interface has always presented the biggest challenge. I am infinitely interested in how people interact with applications and web interfaces, and I hope to indulge that fascination in this class.

Vector Graphics (VECT 1307 01)

I’m excited for Vector Graphics based simply on the curiosity factor. I’ve never really worked with vector graphics all that much (I got a small taste working on maps, charts, and other graphics for The Pioneer and On Your Own magazine), so I’m interested in seeing what can be accomplished.

Lately, it seems like I’ve run into just about every person I ever attended high school with. It usually happens at the mall, the movie theatre, Tim Hortons, or another place where you almost always end up running into somebody. The conversation usually goes something like this.

Former classmate: “Heeey!” (Faking surprise and enthusiasm. Come on, we both saw each other from across the room.)

Me: “Heeeey!”

FC: “How’s it going?

Me: “Good, good. How about you?” (Already a little bit bored with the conversation, but trying to be polite.)

FC: “Great, so what have you been up to?”

Me: “Oh, I just graduated, how about you? (Genuinely bored and searching for an exit at this point.)

FC: “You know, I’ve been going to school/working/sitting on my ass for the last two years.”

Me: “That’s awesome. Well, see you later.” (Yes! An exit!)

FC: “Definitely, we should hang out sometime!”

Me: “Yeah, definitely. Well, uh…bye.”

Repeat that scenario about 25 times and you have the basic structure of many of the conversations I have been a part of in the last couple of weeks. Why do we put ourselves through so much trouble, just to be polite?

I mean, let’s be honest with ourselves here. We pretty much just barely tolerated each other in high school. I know I seemed really nice at the time, but I was secretly wishing the building would burn down or everyone else in the room would just spontaneously combust. I mostly spent my time trying to keep myself amused and not fall asleep.

I’m just being honest.