2012: Hopkins Arts & Sciences Freshman Blog

Moving On Up

Posted by Wafa K.

This is my last blog entry on the 2012: Hopkins Arts & Sciences Freshman Blog. I absolutely cannot believe that freshman year flew by as quickly as it did. It was a really great experience to be able to share that, and all my memories, through this blog, and I hope to continue doing it as a sophomore and beyond in my new blog A Moment of Happiness where I am blogging all by myself.

It has been a joy!

For new stories and experiences of freshmen, check out our Class of 2013: Freshman Blog which will soon have our eight lovely new members of SAAB writing.

All the best!

 

It's over already?!

Posted by Wafa K.

I happen to have an issue with realizing that time is passing – it only seems like a couple days since I last blogged, and yet the date seems to be telling me it has been almost a whole month. How can summer already be over?!

The last time I wrote, I was getting ready to present my research at the NIH’s Poster Day. The two  hours I spent at the poster session were a whirlwind and simultaneously the slowest two hours of my existence. The amount of questions I answered left me with a headache that only a very long lunch with my fellow student interns could cure. It was the perfect ending to a fantastic internship.

(Explaining my research - this was the first time I did it, hence why i am actually smiling)

The rest of my August was filled has been filled with amazingly simple summer activities and avoiding anything that exerts too much energy. It is going to be a shocker, when in twelve days, a professor reminds us to have 300 pages read by the next lecture. But, shockingeffects aside, I am excited to get back to Hopkins and back into the groove of being productive and a student.

Working this summer has made me appreciate the perks of being a student; the satisfaction of productivity and achieving good grades have not yet lost their appeal. The classes that I am taking this semester (more on them after the fall semester actually begins) are both interesting and challenging, and I love nothing more than proving my abilities to myself.

(This would be one of my dream beds courtesy of la boudoir)

As I get ready to go back to Hopkins, including apartment shopping for the requisite kitchen supplies and decorative aspects, avoiding packing at all costs and figuring out where I tossed my keychain back in May, I remember the feelings that I experienced as an entering freshmen last year.

Last August, I was less than a week away from embarking on a journey whose caliber can only be experienced; try as we might to put it into finite explanations.  Everything that I had not yet experienced; meetings friends at Levering for coffee, the MSE libraries’ expansive collection, the professors and classes, study groups where studying is optional, the countless talks and concerts held on campus, SAAB meetings (I can't wait to have the new freshmen join us), Tutorial twice a week, the restaurants on Baltimore, the Peabody Library, and the people I met and have come to call friends. These are the things that make me itch to get back to Baltimore in a week’s time and to dive back into the Hopkins’ community.

(The Peabody Library - which is basically like something out of a dream)

I hope everyone enjoys their last days of August! All the best.

My Planner is Obviously Lying to Me

Posted by Wafa K.

Being employed at the NIH has some pretty awesome perks. I am particularly  drawn to the whole being a part of something much larger than yourself, as one of my fellow interns, Ejike, says “being at the front line of what is happening in science” is pretty much an enticing supposition. That being said, I am also partial to the countless talks and seminars hosting on the campus daily, the insane dream-come-true that is the National Library of Medicine, and the weekly teas that our branch holds where everyone comes together, snacks on goodies and laughs.

My planner is insisted that August is basically upon us and this has induced some freaking out moments of the looming start of school. All in all, as the date of the end of my internship comes closer and closer, I am feeling like I will really miss being employed at the NIH. I’ll miss the hour long commutes on metro, and the picnic tables underneath some of the most fantastic trees I have ever seen. I will definitely not miss my cubicle, but I will miss the staff at this branch, the weekly Journal Clubwhere we got to learn about what each individual staff member was working on, the countless inspirational conversations I have had, and especially the other student interns who have sat in similar headache-inducing cubicles near mine for ten weeks.

The first picture is myself with my favorite fellow summer interns, Sabrina and Ejike, and yes we are being Charlie's Angel - deal with it. And the second is my lovely cubicle - equipped with the gray walls and the conformist PC (which after 11 weeks of use is still not behaving properly).

Now that I’m done with my sappy reflection, I have to make mention of someone of the really cool aspects that are signaling the end of my internship. Firstly, spending time in the virtual reality lab (see pictures for visuals on this) has been limited, but exceptionally interesting. One of the strongest pulls of using the virtual reality technology in the experiments is the large amount of control that the researchers have, which ensures the conclusions they make are based more on actuality and less on circumstance or coincidence.

These are pictures of the virtual reality equipment used by the participants (Many thanks to Laura Wagner at the SBRB at the NIH who is the Lab Manager of the VR Lab for these pictures!)

Secondly, the first Thursday in August is my last day at the NIH, and it also happens to be the NIH-wide Summer Student Poster Day where the students from every Institute and Branch across the entire NIH present posters on the projects that they have worked on and/or contributed to during this summer. It will be interesting to see what other students have spent ten weeks on and to explain some of my work to researchers from all fields of science.

While the NIH takes up a great deal of my time, fitting in those summer-esque activities has been equally as fulfilling. Translation: spending time outdoors beat spending time at a desk – hands down. My father, older sister and I went to Harper’s Ferry for the day a few weeks back, and once we got over the shock of being forced to go to West Virginia, found that it was exceptionally beautiful, even if the actors pretending to be Civil War soldiers took their job a little too seriously.

 

These pictures of Harpers Ferry are some of my favorite.

The National Zoo is a frequent outing with (various parts of) my family and it is an insanely good place to take a walk on a Sunday morning BEFORE the tourists come and start violating personal space. But I digress, because I love DC and so I understand the fact that approximately 5 billion people descend upon the city during its summer months.

So, as I am sitting here finishing up this blog at work (blogs are apparently what need to be done during my lunch hour) looking at my planner freaks me out. It has to be lying to me - I apparently have exactly five days left of my internship and a month before school starts. Where did summer go?!

While I am really looking forward to moving into my on-campus apartment and starting my sophomore year (Organic Chemistry and Calculus – what could be more fun?), I am glad that I get a two week vacation of being a summer bum. That downtime will be essential to me actually functioning on a productive level comes September – so during those few week my DVR and I will become best friends again. I am beyond excited for that prospect. Enjoy the last month of summer!

All the best!

Full Swing

Posted by Wafa K.

When I think of summer vacation, images of sleeping in, sunbathing and general slouching around are evoked. This summer, however, contains none of those. Surprisingly, this doesn’t upset me as much as I thought it would. The reason: I have a pretty incredible internship at the National Institutes of Health (and it’s paid – which is just icing on the amazingly decadent chocolate cake). I am working at the Social and Behavior Research Branch in the National Human Genome Research Institute and the first thing I learned is the abundance of abbreviations in government jobs. It is like another language of a secret society and you have to be initiated. Only then do you get to say “I am a SF at SBRB at the NHGRI in the NIH.” Pretentious? Yes, but oh so satisfying.

That being said, the branch I am working in does a lot of really interesting and cutting edge work. The primary staff scientist that I am working with, Dr. Susan Persky, researches the impact of genetic information and education on social and behavioral aspects of individuals, groups, organizations, etc through an IVET (immersive virtual environment technology). I am codifying data for a study that Dr. Persky recently completed and the data I am looking at is really compelling. Unfortunately, however, it requires hours upon hours of staring at a computer screen and by 3 pm my excel window starts to be a bit blurry. This, of course, leads to mistakes, which leads to me wanting to pull out my hair in frustration and I usually end the day by ignoring my data and reading genetics blogs. Eventually, we’ll be working in Virtual Reality lab with a new study that is starting soon. I really do enjoy working here, and the other summer students, Sabrina and Ejike, that sit near me are basically so awesome they make up for the lack of stimulus I receive from staring at my cubicle.

Other than staring at excel spreadsheets and turning words into numbers, I have also had a chance to go to Portland, Maine this month. Now while I adore the great state of Maine and its breathtaking lakes, mountains and shore – it is unacceptable that it is 50 degrees in June. I cannot be shivering during the month in which summer begins! Besides that, though, it was a lovely three day vacation. A cousin of mine graduated from high school up there, and so we did family slash celebratory activities such as dining on an old ship turned restaurant, renting a boat for a few hours and enjoying a gorgeous day on a lake, frolicking on a beach (yes – frolicking), visiting those famous lighthouses and (most importantly) eating lobster! I love lobster. A lot (as you can probably tell from the giddy look on my face in the picture).

My cousin and her dad (my uncle) - graduating!         My younger sister, and I with our uncle outside                                                        that boat turned restaurant.

My sister, myself and our father on a boat we    My amazing father on the shore in Cape
rented on this gorgeous lake - and yes, we are      Elizabeth in Maine - I did not want
 doing the James Bond thing.                                to leave this beach!                                                                                                                                                                                                                       

I really do love lobster. It is an issue      Maine is famous for beautiful
 and I don't plan on fixing it - ever.        lighthouses - this is one of them.

In addition to adoringly dreaming about lobster, another exciting event happens in June. My older sister turned 22 on the 20th and considering next year she will be in London pursuing a Masters at the London School of Economics and Political Science and by default not here with us, it was a bit more important and bittersweet than normal birthdays. Cue emotional crying and my mother already lamenting being separated from her first born (not to mention my own distress my older sister being away for that long!)

It seems a bit surreal that I have been away from Hopkins for more than a month and a half no; it seems like yesterday I was finishing my final and stumbling back to my dorm room to nap before I moved out of my dorm.

A word of advice to incoming college freshmen, if you are relatively free this summer - ENJOY IT! The carefree summer I was talking about is never really the same after you start college. During childhood, summer represented freedom, returning home at dusk basked in dirt, dripping Popsicles by the pool, camp and forgetting what day of the week it is. You can't really forget what day it is when you work a 9 to 5 job - but if you really enjoy that job, those missing popsicles seem a bit less tragic. So it is a bit of a trade-off, but often you get the better end of the deal.

All the best!

Look Back and Remember

posted by Wafa K.

At the end of school year, it always seems appropriate to reflect on what happened and what was learned. It always seemed odd to me when my older friends in high school came back from college and insisted on being so transformed by their schooling, but now I completely understand the extent to which going to college changes individuals. I feel lucky that I get to attend Johns Hopkins University where change is more often than not for the better, and where passion about knowledge is a commonality. I cannot wait for the next three years, which I know will pass within a blink of an eye, but I plan on taking advantage of every one of them. On that note,  I have to offer congratulations to the Hopkins Class of 2009 (especially our SAAB-ers who will be sorely missed).

My freshmen year started with the blog Madness at its Finest in which I introduce myself, and where I come from as well as my initial experiences, interests, and feelings about being a freshman at Hopkins.

The next blog, Productivity is a State of Mind, reflects my belief about effort in general but it actually discussed the relaxing atmosphere of Fall Break, which was the first day off from school during this school year. This blog also discussed how to get from Washington DC to Baltimore using public transportation (which I did countless times this year). I also discussed the importance of establishing a routine and the experience of taking one’s first college exam.

(This peacock at the National Zoo is absolutely gorgeous, and visiting there is one of my favorite summer activities!)

Implement the Plan discussed the ever-long week (which actually ends of being weeks) of midterms at Hopkins, and my experience voting for the first time in this historic Presidential election.

It took me until mid-November to discover the plethora of coffee places on and around campus, and Moments of Coffee discusses my first experience at Café Q, which is located on the top level of the library. The continuous presence of students, conversation and friends that one encounters there makes it such a great addition to the library and the campus.

Oh Dear was a blog that was extremely honest in terms of discussing the end of semester rush that Hopkins students experience, and the importance of adjusting perspective from being a high school student to a college student and accepting the fact that study andwork styles need to be attuned to a completely new atmosphere.

Following that bout of intense stress and self-analyzing, Survival is the New Success spoke to the reflection that I had between Fall and Spring Semesters. I planned (and was) very productive during Intersession because I wanted to be, rather than because I felt I had to. This blog also discussed my tiny addiction to the winter holiday season despite the fact that I do not in fact celebrate those holidays.

(My tutee, Malik, from the Tutorial Project is a kid that I absolutely adore - this picture is from graduation in the Spring)

Part of that addiction is the concept of relaxing and checking in with family and Why Fix It? is a blog that is my analysis of the amazing winter break that I had doing very exciting retiree-esque activities. I also spoke about my quarrel with New Year’s resolutions and the importance of making resolutions to change oneself continuously.

56th Time is the Charm is a blog that spoke about the inauguration in my hometown of Washington DC briefly, but really spoke about the six classes that I took during my Fall Semester.

The next blog, Days Go By, takes it name from one of my favorite songs by country star Keith Urban and reflects the thought that struck me at this time during the year concerning the rapidity with which time flies by.

One of the things that made me feel like a little kid again was the field trip to Washington DC that my Museum and Controversy class took in February, Field Trips Still Me Happy is a blog that describes the experience and has pictures of some of my favorite architecture on the Mall in DC.

"Life is change. Growth if optional. Choose wisely." is a quotation that I absolutely adore, and the blog reflect the process by which to choose a school to attend and the criteria to think about when choosing schools.

One of those criteria could be housing, and the next blog CRIBS: Wolman 408 East describes my room and suite in Wolman Hall and all of the features that come with the room as well as my personal addendums to the room.

(My empty room in Wolman on the day I moved out)

Hopkins Galore, the next blog, was really my attempt to offer advice to the future college class of 2013 in terms of what are the truly important aspect of choosing a school (and my hope that you will choose Hopkins!)

My last blog of the school year, Simple Joys, discusses the absolutely amazing feeling that overcomes the Hopkins campus when the sun starts shining and beach and quads are routinely filled with lounging  students. The blog also discussed Spring Fair and the Writing Center (which is an amazing facilities that offers services to students free of charge).

It has been a marvelous year full of learning, growth and plentiful opportunities that I could have never guessed before embarking on this Hopkins journey. The newness of the experience added much of the excitement, but the advantage of being an knowledgeable Hopkins student is something that I am looking forward to as a sophomore.

(The sign above the exit on an exhibit in a Smithsonian Museum, where the title of this blog comes from - and very appropriate)

I will end off with this George Bernand Shaw quotation that is also appropriate for reflecting the purpose of college and how it connects to the greater concept of living life, "Life isn't about finding yourself. Life is about creating yourself."

All the best!

Simple Joys

Posted by Wafa K.

I adore spring at Hopkins. The other bloggers have been naming their favorite aspects about this season, but I am going to go with just loving all of it because there are so many fantastic things that I could never choose favorites.

One of the most popular spring activities, for the Hopkins campus as well as the surrounding areas in Baltimore, is the Spring Fair. It is this weekend, and spans from Thursday night until Sunday. There were fireworks on Thursday night, which were pretty spectacular. There are vendors selling all sorts of clothing, jewelry, nick-knacks, etc, as well as food vendors as far as the eye can see. The Roots performed last(Saturday) and from what I hear from my friends who went, they were pretty fantastic. There are also carnival rides for kids, and being a part of the Tutorial project, I got to take my tutee to the fair for two hours. It was absolutely fantastic; it was like living the entire experience as a ten year old, which made me  appreciate it all the more (but I really couldn't wrap my mind around Fried Oreos!).

Some else I appreciate are the academic help services offered on campus. Current students will be quick to say that there is an abundance of those services that are designed to academically aid students. From the Math Help Room to the Learning Den, as well as study consultants and Review sessions 5 days a week, there is never a lack of places that one could go to get help. But one that I had not yet experienced was recently introduced to me, and it deserves an entry of its own.

My Trauma, Melancholia and Ethnic Identity in American Literature professor has been encouraging us to go to the Writing Center for the entire semester, and a few weeks ago I took him up on the advice. Johns Hopkins’ Writing Seminars program is in the top ten in the country, and so it is fitting that out of it was born this service of  helping students with their writing.

Basically, the Writing Center offers Hopkins students individual conferences with experienced tutors, usually graduate students, who have been trained to not only help you with a particular assignment, in any discipline, but also develop your writing skills. The tutors at the Writing Center are equipped to help students with assignments of all ranges, from essays in Expository Writing in freshmen year to a senior thesis, in science and humanities classes and from developing initial ideas to polishing a finishing product.

After having an extremely informative and productive session with the tutor there, I have nothing but praise for the Writing Center. Here is the Writing Center's Web site,  for more information.

Enjoy this glorious spring weather!
All the best

Hopkins Galore

Posted by Wafa K.

Congratulations on your acceptance to Hopkins! One of the most difficult decisions you will ever make is where you choose to attend college, but it also one of the most exciting. Choosing where you go to college is not just deciding where you want to study and learn, but live, grow, thrive and become the person that you want to be.

The first thing that you must do while you are choosing schools is to let go of stereotypes about each particular college. Don’t let what you judge/have heard impact neither the schools you favor nor the schools you cross of your list. It is exceedingly important at this time to be open to finding out something about a school that you were not expecting and to be self-reflective instead of instinctual (that is why you have a month to make your decision!).

Hopkins is a school that everyone has an opinion on; moreover, that situation is best compared to a hundred people commenting on a movie, while only about three of them have even seen it – not exactly the basis for a correct analysis! So be open to discovering that your preconceived opinions may be very skewed, you may be pleasantly surprised.

There are many reasons to choose a school, but you want to make sure that the basis of your decision is a reflection of your long-term goals and your ultimate happiness. I was a student that was very torn about where to go to school and the choices that made me pick Hopkins are the same attributes that have made my freshmen year so amazing.

One of the attributes that made me fall in love with Hopkins was the fact that there is no “typical” Hopkins student - there is no one definition for what it means to be a Hopkins kid. They are all so varied in their interests, extracurricular activities, beliefs, where they come from that you never meet two people that are remotely alike. At the same time, there is a commonality that pulls the Hopkins community together. Our love of, and admiration for, intellectual pursuits and curiosity make this an absolutely amazing place to learn, not only academically but personally as well.

While the my fellow bloggers will dictate the incredible majors, programs of study, opportunities,  classes, location, the professors, financial aid, campus life – I have to focus my opinion on choosing a college as being based on gut feeling once you find out all you can about each school. So, come to one of our open houses, talk to the students there (especially us SAAB-ers in the blue shirts!) and see what it is really like to be a Hopkins student. And if traveling is not an option, check out the admitted students page and the Hopkins forums and ask us the questions that will help you make your decision, we will be genuine and honest in all of our opinions. And lastly, think about making a decision you can (literally) live with and you can’t go wrong.

Good luck and all the best!

 

CRIBS: Wolman 408 East

posted by Wafa K.

Welcome to my home on campus! I live in Wolman Hall, which is right across from the Beach and the library, and sandwiched between McCoy Hall (which houses sophomores) and the Charles Commons (which houses mostlysophomores and juniors). Wolman is a suite-style dorm – so we live in three or four people suites with our own bathroom and a kitchenette to share.

Those are the two most attractive amenities that make Wolman a really coveted housing option for freshmen. They are the biggest reasons why I wanted to live in Wolman, because I like to cook and come from a really hardcore organic food family and so college campus food and I don’t exactly see eye to eye. It is exceptionally nice not to have to leave my suite to go shower, and to only have to share it with three girls as opposed to an entire hall. But, we are responsible for cleaning it, as well as the kitchenette!

I live in a single in Wolman, so I have yet to experience the roommate situation that most freshmen deal with. I have three fantastic suitemates, however, and the dynamics there are pretty similar. During the summer before your freshmen year, you are sent loads of information about the three options for housing (Wolman, AMRs and Buildings A and B), and you rank them based on your preferences, and also what rooming situation you’d prefer (single, double, or (very rarely and only in Buildings A and B) a triple). You also fill out a mini-survey so that Housing can match roommates – you can request a roommate (not suitemates!) but most people find that going random ends up being a great experience.

My bed, which was lofted for the entire first semester, was de-lofted to be a quarter-loft for this semester. That means that two drawers stacked can fit underneath the bed, and I have three of my four drawers under my bed. I also have tons of storage underneath my bed and at the foot of the bed – my stacked boxes from Target are amazing and at $12 a steal! My wardrobe is next to my desk, and has my 20-year-old television on top of it (and it’s three channels are still going strong thanks to the makeshift hanger-turned-antenna my friend made me). My desk is blocking the only window in the room because it faces other rooms and is blocked by Charles Commons, so I get NO natural light, which is a bit of a bummer, but I spend a lot of time outside so I reap the benefits then.

 

 

I decorated my room with pictures of Vincent Van Gogh’s paintings, pictures of family and friends,  paintings and drawings from my artistically accomplished friends, and cut outs from magazines that I like. I actually have more stuff on my wall here than my bedroom at home, but that is because my room at home is painted a gorgeous lavender color so it doesn’t need many additions.I also have my own mini-refrigerator to hold the groceries I bring from home, and a mini pantry in my drawers.

Living in a dorm is a completely eye-opening experience, and it adds a lot to the first year of college. It is, however, most likely completely different from the notion that many prospective students may have – so be open to that variance.

And here is my CRIBS video! I have to give a shout out to my camera-woman, JHU_Saznin who is basically amazing

“Life is change. Growth is optional. Choose wisely.”

Posted by Wafa K.

On Monday, I had the pleasure of spending three and a half hours on a MARC train with a busted engine and no heater, watching insanely gorgeous snow cover the fields in southern Maryland. Today, it entirely too warm for my winter coat and there is little to no breeze. Global warming has me completely befuddled.

Lately I have been thinking about the passing of time since I was in college search process, considering we are already immersed in midterms of my second semester at college (which also has me befuddled, but that’s another story altogether). That couple with the fact that my older sister recently got accepted into graduate school to pursue a Masters in Law, Society and Justice (Congratulations Wided!); reminds of the process by which to choose a school to attend.

And so, in light of this thought process; I would like to share some of the important aspects of picking a school to attend, from my opinion. 

1. What type of school would you like?
There are schools that have a focus on a particular area of studies, while others pride themselves on offering a broad education. There are schools that only have undergraduates, while others have both graduate and undergraduate programs. There are schools that pride themselves on being research institutions (and thereby students get an opportunity to participate in research). There are schools with religious affiliation, historically black colleges, single gender schools, etc. Think about where you would be happy and excel.

2. Where do you want to go to school?
Think about how much of a change you want from where you live now, because for some New Yorkers there is nothing scarier than a small liberal arts college in Montana, while others would be okay with the change of scenery. There are schools, like Hopkins, that have a small liberal arts school feel based on their campus, but are in a urban setting.

3. The Cost?
One of the most important parts for your parents, probably, is the cost and financial aid that the school offers. Make sure that you know how generous the school is, to keep in contact with the school’s Financial Office throughout the process of choosing a school and to have a conversation with your parents about their limitations and expectations in paying for school.

4.Do you like having specific requirements or do you prefer looser guidelines?
Some schools have a very rigid set of requirements that students must adhere to in order to earn a degree, while others, including Hopkins, have certain guidelines to ensure that students take classes other than their majors but do not dictate exact classes nor when you can take them. You may not have know this part of the school’s policy while you were applying, but now that you’ve been accepted make sure you understand their expectations academically.

5. How does the school fit?
How the school feels is the most important part of choosing a college. Even if a school seems like it would be perfect for you on paper, if your gut instinct is against it, it probably is. The objective factors must be considered alongside your feelings about, this is why it is exceedingly important to visit the school, if possible, or speak to someone who goes there and see if you think you’d be happy being a student there.

Those are the top five aspects that can make or break a school in your decision making process, there are obviously other characteristics including activities and special programs, athletics, events, student population, etc that may also influence your opinion.
In all honesty, the instantaneous feeling of knowing the decision you made was right didn’t appear until nearly two months after I had committed to Hopkins but it did appear. And it usually does appear, just not on our time schedule. To choose the right school, you must look past the superficial characteristics of a school that may influence your decision. Because if you choose a school based on its name or its reputation, and not consider what you want to accomplish during your undergraduate career, it will not be a fulfilling four years. Ultimately, I choose Hopkins because it contained every single attribute that I wanted in a school, even all the random ones like being less than two hours from home and having a student volunteer emergency response unit.

I would suggest that you choose a school based on gut feeling, but also evaluation of what that school can offer you. You are deciding where to spend, and invest, the next four years of your life. It is not an overnight decision, and it shouldn’t be. Make the choice that you know will make you happy because, at the end of the day, that is what matters the most and you will always be more productive when you are happy. And, while I hope you choose Hopkins as your destination, it would be more fulfilling to know that you choose the school that is the perfect fit. Good luck!

All the best!

all pictures courtesy of google.com

Field Trips Still Make Me Happy

Posted by Wafa K

In my previous post, I mentioned that I was going on a museum visit with my Museums and Controversy class to the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History (which opened it’s doors in November of 2008 after a two-year period during which it was closed for renovation). I actually went a bit earlier than our class was scheduled to meet and spent a few hours looking at other exhibits (I highly recommend the Within These Walls exhibit which traces the history of a house in Boston from the mid-1760s to 1945, with the actual house there). I also got to eat lunch with a spectacular view of the monument!

We visited the exhibit that was headed by Dr. Arthur Molella, our professor, entitled Science in American Life that traces the intertwining of scientific discoveries, endeavors and accomplishments and their corresponding societal impacts and opinions.

The entrance to the museum actually contains Johns Hopkins University’s own Ira Remsen’s actual lab, and a wax figure of Remsen along with his student Constantin Fahlberg, with an audio with a fabricated conversation the men are having about “pure” versus “applied” science. The exhibit actually was opened in 1994, and was met with heavy criticism from many groups, especially the American Chemical Society that funded the exhibit but who accused the curators of putting an “anti-science” spin on the various parts of the exhibit.

During our visit, Dr. Molella led us around and told us about the different part of the exhibit that has roused certain strong emotions and demands for them to be changed. We also discussed what we found displeasing about the exhibit, in our personal opinions, as well as if the attacks on the exhibit had any footing. It is interesting to note that, in most of the articles that we read critiquing the exhibit before we visited, the authors had not actually visited the museum, and we basing their entire analysis and argument on hearsay. 

It was a pretty splendid trip, and a unique experience to have a curator at the Smithsonian Institute take you on a tour and encourage you to criticize the exhibit that he helped created – the learning and improvement process is continuous, which is just as it should be.

I'll leave you with some pictures of some of my favorite architecture in DC.

All the best!

 

 

 

    

All pictures (exluding Ira Remsen and entrance to Science in American Life courtesy of google.com) from my camera!