Hi there! I'm Brendilou, a '26 from Western Nebraska. As an English major interested in journalism, I'm passionate about writing to educate—to explore differing perspectives, to emphasize the mundane. Through this blog, however, I write to introduce you all to my perspective, my mundane, at the college that's stolen my heart. Welcome to my neck of the woods.
If you are interested in Victorian literature in any capacity, this is the class for you! It is a course taught by the WGSS (Women's, Gender, and Sexuality Studies) department and combines historical and political aspects into a literary seminar. The material is compelling and allows you to view female authors, including Mary Shelley, Jane Austen, and Elizabeth Gaskell, in a different perspective knowing the societal context of the time period and themes in their most popular works.
If poetic language and artistic writing styles are your forte, this is the perfect class for you! Taught by the English/Creative Writing department, Introduction to Poetry is an incredible foundation to storytelling, introducing students to poetry styles from prose to ekphrastic and written to slam. The approach to teaching the course revolved around the strategies of Robert Frost, where the Poetry Room in Sanborn Library held our class, and students' chairs were arranged in a circle rather than in rows of desks. CRWT 12 is one of the most unique and fascinating classes I have taken thus far, and as a result, has become my favorite class I have taken on campus.
Niche classes and concentrations define a Dartmouth education, and before this term, I never intended on taking an Asian art history course, let alone one with such a defined focus. Taught through both the Department of Art History and the Department of Asian Societies, Cultures, and Languages by Columbia University guest lecturer Seher Agarwala, this course contextualizes sacred architectural structures of the Buddhist, Hindu, and Islamic faiths. I left this course with a newfound interest in the artistic practices of East Asian cultures and an appreciation for their diverse historical backgrounds and religions.
For any Los Angeles natives or those generally wanting to delve into the history of southern California, this class is for you! Focusing mainly on the contributions of minorities to the area, this class provides insight on the seldom-discussed history of L.A. through the perspectives of non-white settlers from the 18th century to the present day. Through examining controversial films depicting L.A. (including La La Land and Once Upon A Time in Hollywood), I left this course with a deep understanding of the sacrifices made to construct contemporary Los Angeles.
If the history behind 1960s politics, fashion, art, music, and society interests you in any capacity, this class is the perfect fit for you! Taught through Dartmouth’s Humanities Department, this course covers the late 1950s through the early 1970s, focusing on the era's transformative nature while immersing students in the time period through samples of art and music. What an incredible introduction to an incredibly important decade!
Of the creative writing courses I have taken thus far, none have aligned with my desired career path as well as CRWT 11: Intro to Creative Nonfiction. If you are a prospective journalist, essayist, or fellow Joan Didion devotee, this class was made for you! Although Dartmouth does not have a designated journalism department, the class effectively delves into the art of it while maintaining a creative foundation. With a flexible schedule of fun, thought-provoking writing assignments and weekly peer editing workshops, CRWT 11 immensely refined my writing skills.
If you’re interested in audio storytelling, take CRWT 40.15, Tell Me A Story: Introduction to Nonfiction Radio and Podcasting! Lecturer and producer at Pushkin Industries Sophie Crane uses a hands-on approach for teaching students how to record, edit, and produce their own podcasts. By the end of the term, I had gained extensive experience with Adobe Audition and industry-standard equipment. This is, by far, my favorite class I’ve taken at Dartmouth!
After taking the intro class in the fall, CRWT 21: Intermediate Creative Nonfiction was the next step in refining my journalism skills. Taught by Professor Jeffrey Sharlet, this class, dubbed “The Reporters,” emphasized storytelling in the Upper Valley. Similar to CRWT 11, the class was structured around peer editing workshops and discussions rather than lectures. To conclude the term, students submitted their final pieces to an online publication created exclusively for this class. I look forward to taking the advanced workshop in the fall!
Despite my nonfiction concentration, I found CRWT 60, “Advanced Fiction,” to be the most rewarding class of my term. A class of this nature—an advanced workshop—was a prerequisite for my senior honors thesis in creative writing. By virtue of its five-person size, the feedback on submissions was thoughtful, the assigned readings were tailored to our interests, and the discussions felt intimate and productive. The professor, Thomas O’Malley, was deeply invested in each writer’s growth. I’d recommend this workshop to anyone interested in refining their fiction writing.
I began work for my creative nonfiction thesis this term through CRWT 98: Honors Course I, the springboard for my longest written project to date. During weekly one-on-one meetings with my advisor, Professor Jeff Sharlet, we parsed through interviews and followed their natural through lines to create an outline for my project. I used self-imposed deadlines to keep my writing on track and finished the first draft of two chapters, each around 20 pages in length.
CRWT 99: Honors Course II, a continuation of Honors Course I, marked the culmination of my creative nonfiction thesis and undergraduate writing life. Through weekly workshops with my advisor, Professor Jeff Sharlet, I wrote and polished three more chapters. After ten weeks, my thesis totaled 94 pages across five chapters. I presented it to the Department of English and Creative Writing on May 26. Two weeks later, I received high honors and a department award!
Welcome back to Open Doors—your inside look at life in the Woods! This week, Greta Richardson '26, an engineering major on the pre-med track, showed me around her room in her off-campus apartment. I sat down with her to discuss all things Dartmouth residence halls, classes, and campus life.
Q: Who are you?
A: I'm Greta. I'm a '26 originally from Colorado. I'm an engineering major, so I'm completing the B.E. this fall. I follow the pre-med track in addition to doing a biomedical engineering study. Outside of academics, I play the harp, and I'm involved in Wind Ensemble and Symphony. I also do club gymnastics. I also wrote a thesis on how sex hormones impact the shape and function of a specific type of immune cell. That was written in the engineering department, but obviously touches on biology—it was really awesome to have the support and funding to do that.
Q:How have you been able to pursue your interests at Dartmouth? This can relate to academics or hobbies you've developed outside of the classroom.
A: Dartmouth wants you to have the ability to do a wide variety of things. I feel like the music department is always boasting how their ensemble members are mostly non-majors, and at most other universities you're not able to be in the top music groups if you're not a music major. So, I feel like there are open doors for pursuing opportunities as long as you give it the time.
Q: What's been your favorite class you've taken at Dartmouth thus far and why?
A: My favorite class was probably ENGS 35: Biotechnology and Biochemical Engineering. It was taught by Tillman Gerngross, who was really interested in having a different classroom experience. He likes to teach in this room in one of the engineering buildings called Rett's Room. It has a little balcony, so, during our breaks, we would just go outside and chat with the professor about his life and our life.
The topic of the course was also interesting to me, because I'm very interested in biomedical engineering, specifically with medicine and biology. I'm less into making machines, like X-ray, for example, and more interested in engineering biological molecules. I thought that class was really interesting, but I also liked the way the professor approached teaching. It was different than any other class I had experienced. I took it senior fall.
Q: Tell me about your apartment now! How did you find it?
A: I found mine by word of mouth. Students can reach out to local landlords and ask about availability but also join the housing GroupMe. I think getting into the market during Sophomore Summer is good. If you sublet, it's easier to get a later lease.
Q: How does your room here reflect your personality?
A: I think a lot of this room is more a collection of items that I have acquired throughout my time at Dartmouth than intentional choice of decor. For example, the clothing that's hanging on my door is maybe not traditional decor, but the scarf is a gift from my boyfriend and the jacket is from my study abroad in London, the music Foreign Study Program my sophomore spring. And the jean jacket was a gift from my mom, who she stole from her brother, my uncle.
Greta has collected most of her room decor over the course of several years.
Greta's decor is a mix of sentimental and practical pieces.
The little caricature is from Sophomore Summer, which I feel is a time that everyone really likes to capture. It's with me and my boyfriend, so that's why it's nice and kind of funny to look at. The character artist was doing a bunch of different couples because it was at a frat formal event. And I feel like the shelf is really disorganized, but I don't really have a better way to organize it, and it's all things that I hypothetically need.
Q: Where else have you lived on campus/in Hanover, and which room did you like the best?
A: I was a School House girl, so I started my first year in Little Hall, so the Choates. I was in a one-room double, a very classic first-year residence hall. I feel like we had that room decorated very nicely, and we maximized our space. I actually really liked the Choates. They came with a mini-fridge, which was kind of awesome.
I also feel like people put a lot of effort into becoming friends with people on their floor. I know that's true of a lot of other residence halls but I think something really nice about the Choates is that the common spaces between Brown and Little Hall and Bissell and Cohen Hall are humongous. There would be 30 different people within three different groups mingling in the space. It was so easy for me to go hang out with someone in the common room, because it was a 10-step walk away.
As it goes in residence halls, though, I feel like you definitely climb your way up as you get older at Dartmouth.
My sophomore year, I was only here in the fall and winter, because I was abroad in the spring, but I lived in Mid Massachusetts Hallin one of the three-room quads on the first floor. It was really funny, because me and three of my friends from the Choates lived there, and down the hall was another one of these mirrored rooms, and four of our guy friends from the Choates lived there. So, we kind of kept some semblance of our rooms, just without Brittle [the common space between Brown and Little Hall]. There was a big central room and two smaller rooms coming off the central room, and all of the rooms in Mid Mass have their own bathroom.
Sophomore Summer I lived at 5 Maple Street. That was my first off-campus taste. It was two beds, two baths. It really nice to have a kitchen. It was a fun apartment.
Then junior year I lived in North Massachusetts Hall in a single. It was a good room. I just remember my mom dropping me off, helping me move in, and her being like, 'I feel good about you being in this room.' It's also in a fantastic location.
I lived in Hitchcock Hall for all of senior year. I was in another single. And now I'm in this apartment.
The living room and dining area of Greta's apartment.
I think my favorite had to probably be Hitchcock. It was the cleanest. It was also, similarly, in a really good location. Especially because I split my time between the library and Thayer. It was in the dead center.
Q: Any advice for prospective applicants?
A: As a first year, you don't really get to choose what you get as a housing situation. So just go into it with an open mind. It will be a situation that's probably foreign to you in some way, but it will be really exciting, living in a brand new place with brand new people. In general the residence halls are all pretty good places to live, even the older ones.
Q: Any advice for incoming students?
A: Don't buy new decorations every year. It's such a waste. I understand maybe refreshing some of them, but you shouldn't completely re-do everything every year. You definitely don't have to. I definitely didn't. I still have all my decorations put away in a folder from my first year. I outsourced a lot of my decorations from friends who brought too many. I just took the leftovers. Some of it was brought with me from Colorado. My brother was also a '24, so I actually got the benefit of being able to take some of his.
That's it for this week's Open Doors! Thanks, Greta, for sharing your time and space with us.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
Last September, a friend and I crafted a ten-item bucket list for our final year as undergraduates. It's the end of our senior spring now. These are some of the boxes I've checked.
