The One Where Third Year Finishes

This academic year I have done:

Fifteen exams.

Nine chapter reviews.

Nine film critiques.

Seven essays.

Five short stories.

Five film responses.

Four research prospectuses/prospecti.

Three book reviews.

Two presentations

One presentation precis.

One reading journal.

One website analysis.

One film treatment

 

That works out as 60,445 in courswork assignments alone, who knows how many more thousands of words I've done in exams! Gosh, that's a lot of work. And I mean a lot of work. But, with the handing in of one rather gorgeous looking creative writing portfolio, I have finished my third year. Technically, I still have that 5000-word Humanities Study Abroad Learning Log to finish, but that's not due until October so I'm currently ignoring it.



What to say about my academic experiences of uOttawa? First and foremost, I want to make it clear just how much I love this univeristy, and how completely and utterly wonderful this year has been and what a total privilege it has been to study under some phenomenal professors. Nevertheless, being an exchange student puts me in a unique position to do a comparison of Ottawa and Exeter, and to assess the relative merits and weaknesss of each one.

The first thing to note is that uOttawa has a lot more students than Exeter does and this immediately sets it at a disadvantage. Ammenities are stretched to breaking point; there aren't enough computers, study spaces, residence spaces. Classes, particularly in first year, are enormous and the sheer number of students means that you just don't recognise anyone like you do at Exeter.

Community seems to me to be the biggest weakness of uOttawa in comparison with Exeter, and I think there are several reasons for this. Firstly, there is no real sense of allegiance to one department. Whilst I have enjoyed and benefitted from the flexibility in module options, the result is that classes have transient populations. In the Theology Department at Exeter, I can name every single person in my year, most of the year above and below and can pick out any theology student from the crowd. At uOttawa that is not the case. The Major/Minor/Electives set-up means that class populations are not consistent, and this significantly hinders class participation.

Secondly, there is a lack of community with regards to student societies. If there's one word the societies at uOttawa know, is is the word 'clique.' There are an extortionate number of societies with a lot of overlap as to what they offer - there are about a dozen Christian groups, sororities and fraternities trying to make like their cousins to the South and failing miserably. Furthermore, at the society events week, I would hazard a guess that few than 1/4 of societies actually turned out to promote their club and the SFUO and its seriously out-of-date and non-user friendly website did not help matters either. If you had to cast a sweeping generalisation over the student body of uOttawa, you would have to say that it is apathetic. They can't wait to graduate, they don't wax lyrical about the uni or their department - and it is easy to see why. uOttawa is about numbers: tuition fees are extortionate and it is impossible to see where they are invested in the academic side of things. There is a redundant "living wall" in one of the buildings which the university spent money on, whilst its students work three jobs trying to stay afloat. I have heard so many stories of students having to take a year out so as to try and gain back some money for the next year's education - how is that supposed to foster school spirit and community?

Living Wall...

The economic situation of students leads to another weakness of the university. And I'm sad to say, that weakness is in its academic standards. If you are working three jobs, plus enrolled in four to five classes a semester with the number of assignments as I have listed above, you are simply not going to have enough time to do them justice or to advance as an academic. I watched a guy in my Leonard Cohen class, a class specifically for honours students, fail an exam because he had to choose between studying and working - and knowing Leonard Cohen titles doesn't put food on the table. Such apathy is an insult the decent professors who just want to inspire their students and see them advance academically.

As a result of the general apathy towards studies, classes are at a very superficial level, and professors are forced to structure their classes in such a way to make sure that students won't fail. Take my Bible and Film class; it is taught my one of the foremost academics in the film and religion field, but she felt compelled to give us five film responses, worth two marks each: one for saying something and one for just handing it in. It was a fourth year seminar. How absurd! Paper proposals don't challenge you academically, multiple choice exams and guess-the-title tests are fact re-call, not brain-builders.

Part of this lower level of academic ability can no doubt be in part attributed to the aforementioned major/minor/electives set-up. There is no consolidation of skills within one academic discipline. The students here are (again, I'm using sweeping statements), jack of all trades and masters of none. So, you major in Psychology but you minor in English and take electives in geography, Aboriginal Studies, Canadian Studies and music. Good for you - you know a little about a lot. I wrote two essays on A.M. Klein this year, and people were shocked by that. 'Why are you writing about the same thing?' I wasn't writing about the same thing, I wrote two in-depth essays on two separate areas of A.M. Klein's work and influence, one for English and one for History, consolidating on an initial study of him and building on it, further exploring an interest. Yes, I have undertaken a diverse range of classes this year, but in every single one of the, I have brought my skills as a theologian to them.

Also, there is no sense of academic rigour in the practices of uOttawa. True, they do bleet on about the perils of plagerism an awful lot, but they're sloppy in other ways. Here's the situation in Exeter:

1. Essays have strict word counts, go over, capped at 40%
2. Essay have stict deadlines, 1 second late, capped at 40%
3. Essays are marked anonymously, so no favouritism.
4. Essays are second-marked, just in case any favouritism slipped through and to assess the marking of the module convenor.
5. Professors are nowhere near the exam hall.
6. You have a designated seat for exams.
7. You do not enter exam hall without permission.
8. You stay for the entire length of the exam.
9. You so much as breathe loudly in an exam and you are capped at 40%.

Compare this with Ottawa:

1. I want between 10 and 15 pages.
2. Just hand it in in class.
3. Oh, it's a week late? Ok, I'll take off a mark.
4. Make sure your name is on your essay.
5. Some of them were marked by the TA.
6. Stroll into the lecture theatre where your exam is.
7. Have a little chat.
8. Ask your prof questions during the exam.
9. Finish a three-hour exam in half an hour.

It's an absurd situation.

However, I must tell you about three completely wonderful plus ridiculous things to happen in my final ever uOttawa exam:

1. I wrote in one short answer question, 'It is no longer about how you feel, but who you feel; why pray when you can Facebook?'
2. I wrote in an essay, 'Women became discontented with celibate men who only break bread forcing them to break the body's pain thresholds by excessively procreating in order to fulfil the Catholic ideal.
3. I took my shoes off and my prof came over during the exam to mock me about it and then grabbed by bear foot and whispered, 'They've all gone to market!' What an absolute babe.

Another thing I have noticed about uOttawa students is that their standard of writing is much lower

You can take clandestine photos in exams at uOttawa

than at Exeter. I had two marks taken off me by the TA (rant on that to come) because I didn't put 'In this essay, I will...' in my introduction, and 'As I have shown...' in my conclusion. There's a reason for that: I'M NOT TWELVE YEARS OLD AND WRITING MY FIRST SECONDARY SCHOOL ESSAY. To go back to my Leonard Cohen class, it is ridiculous that our esteemed professor, practically every week had to tell fourth year honours English students how to write. Undergraduate essays here are very formulaic and infantile in their language - and talk about stating the bleeding obvious in some of them! There have been far too many times when I've wondered if I'm back at GCSE classes rather than at university.

TAs, aka the spawn of Satan. It's such a chore being more intelligent than your TA. That is all.

Nevertheless, I do still have so much love and affection for uOttawa. I have learnt from extraordinary professors - Mayne, Anderson, Siouis, Reinhart, Anctil - and the opportunity to learn about Jewish Canadians and First Nations has been such a joy. I am so proud of the work I have done over the year - hence why I'm forcing you all to read the essays I post, and with Anderson and Mayne in particular, I have felt the same level of pushing to succeed as I feel from my professors back at Exeter. I won't forget what I've learnt this year, especially the opportunity to visit a First Nations reservation last November.

And I have my uOttawa stash and I wear it proudly.