Friday, October 23, 2009

Spring Courses

by Christopher Cocca

Next week, we'll be getting a list of classes and seminars for the spring semester. It's hard to believe the fall is half over. What are some metrics you've used for picking what to study and with whom? I based my fall selections on the teachers that seemed likely to lead the kind of class that would help me in the areas I felt I most needed, and, of course, the curriculum. I ended up with two outstanding teachers and two exceptional groups of classmates and classes.

What are your methods for class selection?

8 comments:

  1. I knew that I needed some sort of ethnic literature class to supplement my writing and I also knew I wanted a daytime class. There was only one class being offered that fit the description and I'm very excited about it because the professor is a leader in the field and I can't wait to work with her. I'm actually supposed to go meet her next week. I'm hoping she'll work with me on making her class MFA friendly (meaning w/out a 20 page research paper or something). Either way, I'm very excited. We'll see how that goes.

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  2. This fall I took a Forms of Fiction class, required of all incoming fiction students, a setting class because my work is heavy on setting, and a lit class on Mark Twain (to get half of my 2 lit course requirement out of the way).

    I am really excited about this spring because of two things--first I will finally have workshop, and second, "War Writing" is offered and I have a story set in the Vietnam War that I want to finish. For my third class this spring I'll probably take a Forms of Nonfiction class for my out-of-genre requirement.

    I LOVE choosing classes. It is so exciting.

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  3. Interestingly, OSU is on the quarter system (a system I have been on since being an undergraduate) so I will be taking another four classes this year, two in the winter and two in the spring.

    Next quarter I am taking a poetry workshop with Andrew Hudgins and a special topics class that is being taught as an additional poetry workshop on the sonnet by Henri Cole.

    In the spring I will take a regular poetry workshop with Henri Cole and a forms class on verse libre with Kathy Fagan. I am so excited I just can't hide it!

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  4. love reading about the classes you guys are taking :) as a low res student i didn't choose my classes, so to speak, but i did choose which ones i would write papers on and that was always a fun little moment.

    i miss picking classes, it was always one of my favorite parts of school :)

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  5. In the spring I'll be taking a poetry workshop with Todd Davis (called The Material World: Poetry and the Body), a nonfiction workshop with Elizabeth Kadetsky, a lit sem called Black American Poetry: The Music of Thought, and a 1 credit Comp Lit seminar called Foundations of Modern Theory. And a 1 credit pedagogy course again - it's the second part of the one I'm in now.

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  6. Oh wow... you mean you all get a CHOICE? I had advising last week and it was less like advising and more like being told what to take. However, I am quite thrilled with my courses: structure of verse (a survey course of sorts), poetry workshop, non-fiction workshop, and a publishing class. I didn't get a choice, but I can't complain because anything is better than my current pedagogy course!

    (Tory--I am so jealous that you are working with Andrew Hudgins AND Henri Cole! Grr!)

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  7. Whitney, I hear Andrew likes to read our poems in baby voices, especially the ones he dislikes. So it may not be as fun as you might think. WE SHALL SEE!

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  8. OMG Tory...you MUST report back on how that goes!

    I'm shaking my fist at Emily and her Black American Poetry class. That's exactly the class I would love to take!

    To be more specific, I'm taking a Harlem Renaissance lit class and my poetry workshop next semester.

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