Fall Break is over and some of us are left wondering whether it really ever began. We’ve reached the point in the semester when we all need a break from classes to regain some of our sanity, catch up on rest, see friends we haven’t talked to in ages because of the piles of homework amassing on our desks and just generally take a breather.
Unfortunately, it doesn’t seem as if the school thinks we need that break. Thanksgiving is about a month and a half away-we should be able to wait until then without having a nervous breakdown. Right?
As most of us know, that’s not the case. Thanksgiving brings with it a whole new set of issues to stress us out: finals are just around the corner, and we’ve got to deal with strange relatives that have a tendency to argue when they get together. Fall Break is supposed to be a college student’s chance to relax without these things hanging over our heads. Instead, our Break has been placed on a Friday by the powers that be, eliminating any semblance of an actual break for the majority of students who don’t have Friday classes. To most of us it’s just business as usual.
The University is always boasting about our large population of international and out-of-state students, yet it doesn’t take into consideration that three days isn’t enough time for many people to get home, and even if it is, the cost is often prohibitive. The Butler Volunteer Services Center wants to send students to aid in hurricane relief efforts and on other Alternative Fall Breaks, but its plans are limited to either leaving on Thursday, when students are supposed to be in class, or at the crack of dawn on Friday to some place nearby. Then, of course, are the students who just choose to take a longer weekend anyway (especially with Yom Kippur falling on the Thursday before the Break), and the professors who think that a measly day off means that we’ll have plenty of time to do some extra homework.
It’s not that we want a week off of classes like Notre Dame and Princeton enjoy-we are here to learn, after all-but one day just isn’t enough to serve the purported purpose of Fall Break. An extra day added to the Break next year, preferably on a Thursday so as not to miss two Monday-Wednesday-Friday classes in a row by having Monday off, would be enough to make the break a time of relaxation, rather than a tease that only further frustrates us.