Hello, Eda here: full-time learner, part-time writer, and pretty much a happy amateur at everything else. My hobbies include reading, discovering new movies, and looking at the pictures of my cat. On campus, you can find me peer supporting for the Mental Health Union and SAPA, writing for Spare Rib, doing research in psychology, or listening to Turkish & English alt-rock. Feel free to ask me about taking a gap year, transitioning to a new cultural space, or college in general!
This class discusses the concepts of sex and gender in the broader context of issues related to race, class, national identity, and more. I loved this class because it helped me better understand how systemic inequality affects individual lives and made me think about ways to change it. Professor A'Ness is such an inspiring prof!
In this first-year writing seminar, we discussed how avant-garde movements from futurism to punk rock have constituted a rebellion against the status quo. I loved all the readings for this class and Professor McCann inspired me to take more courses in the English department!
In this course, we learned all the basics of fiction: character, plot, setting, etc. My favorite parts of the course were receiving feedback from other students, reading my peers' work, and having fiction readings as assigned course work! I also appreciated all the guest speakers we had, who were experienced writers in their respective genres.
As an aspiring clinical psychologist, this course has been one of the best classes I have taken at Dartmouth so far. The class focused on the etiology, diagnosis, characteristics and treatment of various mental disorders. Professor Hudenko has been one of the greatest lectures I had the pleasure of meeting. As a clinical psychologist himself, he had extensive knowledge in not only the theory, but also the practice of clinical psychology. He also succeeded in making a lecture-based class feel interactive and dynamic.
We covered the complex neural and biological mechanisms of multiple mental health disorders ranging from common conditions like anxiety to more complicated illnesses such as schizophrenia. In addition to reading about the cutting-edge research in this area, we also read memoirs and watched documentaries about the mental illnesses to focus on how these conditions are affecting people in real life. Professor Funnell is one of the best profs I had!
As an aspiring clinical psychologist, this has been one of my favorite classes at Dartmouth. We learned about different therapy methods, how and when to use them, their advantages, and shortcomings. The class was incredibly engaging with Professor Hudenko's frequent demonstrations of methods, therapy videos, and guest speakers. I would recommend this class to every psychology major.
I worked at Dimock Health Center as part of my community health internship. I was part of a team of summer interns who were college students like myself. We worked as patient advocates that helped people reach out to resources regarding housing, food, utilities, etc. Most of our work involved calling patients, helping them fill out forms, and researching resources. I learned so much about community health resources and how to communicate with a diverse set of patients. It was an invaluable experience!
I took classes in the School of English and Drama at Queen Mary University of London. My favorite class of the term was called London Performance Now, which involved going to different performance events in London and discussing them in class. It was the perfect opportunity to explore the cultural landscape of London.
As the title of the course suggests, this class was about food: its history, economics, and cultural practices. I learned a lot through this course thanks to guest speakers, thought-provoking readings, and engaging assignments. My favorite assignment in this course was writing about a family recipe; I learned so much about my family's history as well as the cultural conflicts in my home country. Overall, it was among the best classes I have taken at Dartmouth. Plus, we even got to eat delicious food cooked by our classmates!
Dartmouth has groups of requirements for graduation in addition to the requirements for your declared major. Before starting my studies, I was not so enthusiastic about this policy, as I thought it would restrict the kind of classes I wanted to choose. However, now that I am in my junior year, I realize that these distributive requirements enriched my studies instead of restricting them. Plus, I noticed that I naturally fulfilled them without even trying to!
So, what are distributive requirements?
Dartmouth requires every student to take classes in different areas of study, such as in social sciences, natural sciences, technology, traditions of thought, literature, arts, and laboratory. I ended up fulfilling a good chunk of these requirements through my psychology major. A lot of the psychology classes naturally fulfill the social sciences, such as Social Psychology and Abnormal Psychology. As I am also interested in neuroscience, I took classes such as Introduction to Neuroscience and Neuroscience of Mental Illness, which ended up filling two of my natural sciences distributives. As part of the psychology major, we are also required to take a statistics course, which fulfills the quantitative & deductive science distributive, and a laboratory course that fulfills, naturally, the laboratory requirement.
Other distributives I ended up fulfilling because of my potential interest in English literature, while my introductory creative writing course in fiction helped me complete my art distributive. In addition to the distributives, there are also world culture requirements, which means all Dartmouth students need to take courses in Western cultures, non-Western cultures, and culture and identity. All distributive requirements can also fulfill world culture requirements. One of my favorite classes I have ever taken at Dartmouth, Staging Rebellion, a theater course about Latin American guerilla theater, fulfilled my non-western culture requirement. Similarly, the Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies course I took my freshman fall, called WGSS 10: Sex, Gender, and Society, was the perfect course for the culture and identity requirement.
In short, my experience with the distributive and world culture requirements proved me wrong. They were a natural part of my academic experience at Dartmouth rather than hindering it. I have yet to take classes in technology and traditions of thought, so stay tuned!
At Dartmouth, there is an undergraduate requirement for language; after all, it is the liberal arts! Fulfilling this requirement looks different for various people and I will focus on my experience.
Traditionally, Dartmouth students take three courses during a term, but I decided to take four courses this term! Learn about course load and the academic system at Dartmouth.
As I approach the halfway mark of my Dartmouth journey this spring, I find myself reflecting on the significance of distributive and world culture requirements in shaping my academic experience.
Witnessing an eclipse was one of the most exciting days in my life to date, and a solid reminder of our place in this universe. Read on to hear about it!
This is my final term before senior year, which is both exciting and terrifying at the same time. One thing I am excited about is the classes I am taking this term, so let me tell you more!
