Online only: Finally, fall break

As elections for IUSA are coming up and campaigns are getting underway, it’s a good time to reflect on some things that previous administrations have done. Or not done. Or not done quickly enough.

By this, of course, I mean fall break.

The current administration got it pushed through for fall 2012. About time, but it’s too late for juniors or seniors. And that’s a shame.

Spring semester, for all its faults (and by that I mean the weather), has one thing fall semester does not: a week-long break somewhere mid-semester. And it’s awesome.

I’ve never been to Daytona Beach. In fact, I usually go home for spring break so I can lay around on the couch all day and eat my parents’ food and sometimes, for a change, go to other peoples’ houses to lay around on their couches and eat their food. Lame? Yes, but after midterms, it’s a nice, relaxing week.

That’s what fall semester needs: a nice, relaxing break right after midterms so we can recover and be in a fresh(er) state of mind heading into exams.

You might say, “But what about Thanksgiving?”

To which I respond, “You must not have eight cousins.” (Which is a shame, because having eight cousins rocks. But, I digress.)

I have eight cousins. They are eight of the craziest, most awesome people ever. Spending Thanksgiving with them (and my parents, siblings, aunts, uncles, grandparents and other miscellaneous relatives) is a blast.

But it means no time to rest.

It also means no time to work. Not that I want to spend my break working. But with two weeks to go before exams (and usually about five days to go before groups projects are due), Thanksgiving is just at an awkward time. So even if I didn’t have all those relatives, I’d be up to my ears in term papers and studying, just like everyone else.

So Thanksgiving might be a period of time when we don’t have class, but it’s not exactly stress-free. We could use a few days — or better yet, a week — in the middle of October to lay around and do nothing.

However, that cuts into the semester. The solution? Start classes a week earlier.

We do have about a week shy of four months for summer break. We don’t need that long. Cut it short by a week, and we’ll still have plenty of time. Besides, IU’s already the odd man out. Not EVERY university starts in August, but it’s actually unusual in these parts to start as late as we do. Purdue and DePauw both start several days to a week before IU. It’s not like we would be dragging ourselves back to school while everyone else was still at home.

This seems very simple. So simple an undergrad can figure it out without putting in any extra effort. So why in the world can’t the administration, full of presumably smart people who usually have several fancy-sounding degrees, work it out?

Maybe I’m just bummed because I, like generations of Hoosiers before me, will be missing out on the fun that is fall break. Maybe I’m irritated because it’s not nearly as hard to arrange a week off as people make it out to be (and seriously, what’s the big deal about one-day-a-week labs missing out for some sections and not others? Just give us a full week off. The people at DePauw seemed to have figured it out). Maybe because it seems every other school gets at least a couple days off (which isn’t awesome but is better than nothing), and we don’t.

Or, at least, not yet.

I applaud the folks on IUSA who (finally) got this fall break business pushed through. (It’s only been on the winning parties’ campaign promises list for the last decade.) And, despite the sarcasm, I really do think this is a great step and will greatly benefit future (and some current) IU students. Finally, IU is getting with the program and offering something that will not only benefit its students, but also its professors.

E-mail: hanns@indiana.edu