By Dessa Bayrock (The Cascade) – Email
Print Edition: April 11, 2012
I’m an English major, just finishing up the third year of my degree, and I have a confession to make: I have yet to take my first-year lab science.
After this semester, I will have finished every other non-English requirement my degree specifies, some more grudgingly than others, but at the end of the day I’ve buckled down and gotten it done. But for some reason, I keep shirking away from the lab science. It repulses me. It grates me the wrong way. I have shirked for four years and I wish I could continue to shirk, but push has come to shove and I have to get it done. I am currently enrolled in Geography 102 for the summer semester. Wish me luck.
But this entire process of procrastination begs a simple question: why am I so opposed to taking a lab science? And this, in turn, begs another simple question: why do I even have to take a lab science in the first place?
It’s not that I hate science; up to the last moment of grade 12, I was seriously torn between chemistry and English, and even now I recognize that here is a very real need for scientists and researchers in our society. I wish them the best of luck.
And It’s not that I’m buried so deeply in books that I can’t see the bigger picture; I swallowed my medicine and understood that past requirements were good for me, even if I didn’t have a burning desire to take them. I’ll admit it: many of these classes forced on me by requirements taught me things I wouldn’t have learned otherwise. Many argue that this science requirement performs exactly the same function.
So why am I so disgruntled about taking this class?
There is a huge difference in the thought-process behind learning science and learning humanities. Science is far more black and white: you’re either right, or you’re wrong. There is only one atomic weight for chlorine, and it’s going to stay that way forever.
This is in direct contrast to English, where new ideas are always being developed and there is an endless amount of material that can be contrasted against itself. Pardon the pun, but it’s a far more organic process than any science class – at least at the first-year level. There is far more freedom to try new things and flesh out new ideas.
In a laboratory, on the other hand, if you try out new things there is a very real possibility that you will cause an explosion.
I’m not interested in taking a first-year science because I know that I will have to spend a lot of time memorizing a lot of black and white information I will never use again. You can argue that I need time to “explore” and “learn about the scientific method,” but let’s be realistic: I did that in high school. If I had an aptitude or a passion for this stuff, I would have discovered it by now. Being forced into yet another lab science “for my own good” seems like backtracking, especially when I could use that same time poring over other concepts, in English, that really spark my imagination.
Yes, I’ll suck it up and take my lab science, and yes, I’ll try to enjoy it while I’m there. But I’ll continue to resent the hell out of this requirement until I put on that ridiculous hat, walk across the stage, and receive a degree – especially while purchasing what I’m sure is an absurdly expensive geography textbook.
