Opinion

First-degree burn

Graduation audit makes life a living hell for 48 hours

By Rick Redmond

Posted on Oct. 29, 2004, at 12:00 a.m.

Journalism students, like students from many other majors I’m sure, are a tough and hearty bunch. We’re thick skinned, primed for conflict and rarely scared away from a risky endeavor. It’s just not in our nature to back down from a challenge.

But a few things in life have the ability to give me mild arrhythmia. The word “libel” sends shivers up and down my spine, deadlines can be a headache, and anyone who puts a kink in my schedule – like my graduation schedule – can wager that I’ll be spouting more than a few obscenities.

I am hell bent on graduating on time, and by on time I mean after my five years of hard work for my one bachelor of arts degree and sole minor. I decided to have a degree audit done just to make sure all my little ducks were in a row. I need to be sure that, come May, I can don my cap and gown, have Kennedy hand me my diploma, slap him on the ass on my way out of the University of Maine and probably go punch in and continue bartending. Not too much to ask, I think.

Degree audits, for those of you who don’t know, are the devil’s doing. They’re processes designed to make students want to gnash their teeth, pull their hair out and sob openly in front of grown men and women. I’ve got the bleeding gums, bald spots and puffy eyes to prove it; I had one done on Monday.

Thinking I was all set and on-track to graduate in May, I sauntered casually into the Office of Student Records and requested my degree audit. By my reasoning and thinking, “I should be all set to graduate after seven more credits. Next semester is going to be a cake walk.”

The lady I went to see, who was extremely friendly I might add, could smell my cockiness as I entered the room. I sat down expecting her to confirm my notion that I would be coasting through my last four months at UMaine. I think I could hear the office pool collectively snickering as I sat down, put my feet up on the administrative assistant’s desk and fired up a Camel light. Then she laid the hard news on me after a few minutes of walking me through my transcripts.

I need how many credits to graduate?

My world was crashing down all around me. What do you mean history needs to be taken in a sequence? None of those English courses count as a literature credit? Who the hell needs philosophy anyway? I’ve already taken American Government.

How could five years of careful planning and prudent selection of courses leave me 21 credits short of graduating? My head was spinning at that point and I was thinking; “How am I going to survive another extra semester here?” My parents have already booked a hotel for graduation for Christ’s sake.

Now that I was freaking out about my graduation schedule, everything else in my life begins to crumble. My radio show didn’t get done, I couldn’t hand out assignments for my section, and did the Red Sox play tonight? I was so stressed out that even my schizophrenic cat was giving me the one-eye.

But there appears to be a light at the end of my tunnel. I paid a visit to the journalism department office to see if they could sort this out. No more than five minutes after I had explained my predicament and the administrative assistant called me a little bitch for crying, she had solved my crisis. I felt as though I had been touched by an angel.

The communications department lady undid two days of needless worrying in five minutes. She actually told me she had no idea why students went anywhere else anyway. I couldn’t agree more, and I know now I should have gone there in the first place.

So let that be the lesson you; Learn from my mess. If I can save one other student from the public humiliation I felt as I collapsed into a pile of sobs outside Wingate Hall, then my trial need not be in vain. Never mind where you’re told to go; go with your gut, and stick to getting directions from the people who’ve probably seen you cry before anyway.

Rick Redmond is a senior journalism major who is sane, happy and again looking forward to May’s commencement.

This entry was posted on Friday, October 29th, 2004, 12:00 am. You can follow any responses to this article through the RSS feed.