Serving the GW Community since 1904

The GW Hatchet

AN INDEPENDENT STUDENT NEWSPAPER SERVING THE GW COMMUNITY SINCE 1904

The GW Hatchet

Serving the GW Community since 1904

The GW Hatchet

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What I learned in 2003

A new year brings a fresh start for everyone, but the only way to make the future brighter is to learn from the past. Here are just a few of the things GW taught me in 2003.

On our campus, deans have been devalued like the Mexican peso. Sometimes after walking out of Phillips Hall or Rice Hall I think I’m Mr. Big Shot because I just met with the assistant dean of X or the dean of Y or associate dean of Z. But then I’ll take a gander at a GW directory, in which you can’t count five continuous words without running across some type of a dean. Not only do I think there are more deans than there are Aramark employees, I think that if every dean at GW voted in the D.C. primary, the polls would have to stay open until midnight to handle the extra voters.

Speaking of midnight, I liked Midnight Madness and I like Midnight Breakfast. There’s just something nice about the University adapting its events to fit students’ schedules. If the administration would just keep the idea rolling, then we’d have no more 8 a.m. classes, and the only classes that started at 9:30 would be English or theater or any other class with a syllabus that requires you to show up for class with a Grande Mocha something.

According to GW, my textbooks have depreciated in value faster than both ImClone and WorldCom. Many times I’ve heard about a good class and registered for it, only to have the professor stop teaching it, or my spot filled by someone who’s working on his dissertation, or have it taught by a professor who doesn’t know how to lecture and compensates by requiring me to buy $2,384.73 worth of textbooks for his class.

I applaud anyone with the values of the Chik-fil-A guy, who won’t let his stores stay open on Sundays because of religious reasons. But I’m convinced that if he came to J Street and saw our Sunday dining options, he’d take pity on us and fire up the deep fryer himself.

You can visit any college campus in the country and you’re not going to find a place with more building projects underway, near completion or recently completed. I expect any day now to see GW President Stephen Joel Trachtenberg hang a big “Manifest Destiny” banner across 20th Street and start buying up Federal buildings like they’re on the cheap side of the Monopoly board.

One thing is certain at GW – if you want to, say, fight the depletion of plankton in the South China Sea, there’s already a student organization dedicated to just such a task. With a great many student organizations championing causes I couldn’t care less about, I often wonder why there hasn’t been a student group formed to go ballistic on our mascot, the Colonial. You’d think that the most extreme of the anti-war College Democrats would jump all over this issue. As for me, I’ll stick with the rich history of our beloved mascot, but it surprises me that there hasn’t been a power-hungry freshman ready to make a name for himself start a movement to rename us the George Washington Doves or something like that.

On Friday, Jan. 9, GW hosted a presidential debate between Al Sharpton, Dennis Kucinich and Carol Mosley Braun. I think between public appearances these guys must do nothing but alternate between watching “Seabiscuit” and “Hoosiers.” Calling the candidate debate a presidential debate is like calling my grade point average Harvard material – wishful thinking, but not bearing any trace of reality.

Finally, I believe that free labor greases the wheels of democracy. It’s entirely possible that if GW students abruptly stopped interning on the Hill and with nonprofit organizations, our government would crumble like a stale Tastycake. Without interns, the outgoing mail in congressional offices would reach insufferable levels and crush legislative aides under its weight. Also, nonprofits would have to start using their salaried employees for browsing the Internet, thus filling the void of wasting time left vacant by the lack of interns.

After a year in Washington, I feel a little like Dorothy in “The Wizard of Oz.” No, I’m not fixated on going home, and I definitely don’t have the desire to purchase a little Toto rat-dog, but I have learned a whole lot about life from some very strange people in a very strange place.

The writer is a senior majoring in political science.

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