Reading day

Today is the official College Reading Day. This day is always on the Wednesday before final exams begin (Thursday). Why do they call this day reading day? Perhaps it has to do with the enormous amounts of reading Hillsdale Students are given, an amount which only the most diligent will ever accomplish reading on time for each class. Personally my classes amounted to the following amounts of reading this semester:

Micro Economics: 350 pages (extra large, glossy text book), 50 pages (average sized)
American Foreign Policy: 1800 pages (780pg textbook) (over 1000 pages handouts)
Gnostics, Pagans, Heretics: Uncertain (at least 1500, bare minimum)
Fiction and Faith: 500 pages (novels, short stories, anthologies...)
History of Economic Thought I: 600 pages (Primary Source Text and Interpretive Text)

Side reading (my fault :)) Bible - 500 pages;

Total: 5,500 pages, That's 80pages/day, M-F. And these pages are not harboring wimpy reading. These are, most of the time, primary source documents. That means we're reading the actual "stuff" instead of what John Doe thinks about the "stuff," even though John Doe was never there.

Now most students here don't "just" read. They also have to write papers, work on projects, be involved in at least 2 extra-curricular activities, eat, and sleep.

This is why students here are so busy and stressed-out almost 100% of the time, however, they only realize it during finals week.

So give someone an encouraging word today; pray with them. We all need it.

Maybe today shouldn't be called the Reading Day. Maybe it should be called the Sleeping: getting enough rest before Finals steal it all, Day. If they really wanted to give students enough time to catch-up in their studies in order to do exceedingly well on their Finals, they would give us at least a week. Nevertheless, one Day gives us hope.


God bless.