There are few things as exciting as when Yale OCI (the online version of the Blue Book, Yale’s catalog of its courses) goes live.
Something about having infinite choices to shape your future term, the prospect of buying books, the thought of meeting professors you’ve always wanted to know, and more, make me feel the same exhilaration Harry (or Hermione, rather) did in Diagon Alley for the first time. The scene had the uncanny ability to capture the excitement of the equivalent of buying 64-pack Crayola crayons, construction paper, and Book Sox perfectly.
Bluebooking is a rite of passage at Yale—its wealth of amazing classes and possibilities an exact mirror of all that you can see and do and experience during shopping period. So you can always say, “Oh, you’re taking Game Theory with Ben Polak? I shopped that class! I feel you!” Or, it can be a source of anxiety. “Darn, I can’t believe I can’t take those 923084239 classes I really liked this term…” But, at the end of the day, it works out. Things fall into place. You find yourself with a(n almost) seamless schedule that allows you to grow, with classes that reach out to each other, connecting, transmuting, and challenging what you know or think you do.
Around 11 am, Friday, July 8, in Athens, Greece, Elizabeth emailed our Athens group that OCI was, in fact, up. I had about a hundred things I had to do at work, but I couldn’t resist. There are so many ways to Blue Book but I thought I would share the way I usually do it:
Step 1: Ever since I declared my majors, I always click on “Economics” first. Then, proceed to “South Asian Studies.” Peruse. Scroll. Wide-eyed. Wide-eyed. Salivate. Salivate. Scroll. Write down everything you want to take on a piece of paper.
Step 2: Realize that you have a LOT of classes you want to take…and can no longer handwrite them all.
Step 3: Switch to your electronic application of choice: Excel, Word, NotePad.
Step 4: Start going methodically through every single subject area so that you do not miss any potential cool class (granted, now as a rising senior, I do skip “Applied Physics” and “Akkadian” and “Sanskrit”). [Sorry, Applied Physics majors, Sanskrit scholars, and Akkadian speakers, no offense intended!]
Step 5: Create the master list. This is THE list. The coveted list. That you will look back on after graduation and realize that this, all this, was offered at Yale your Fall 2011 term.
Step 6: Start organizing by priority. What class must you take (Intermediate Chinese, here I come)? What class could you not possibly take? Chances are, that Monday 9 am class has to be really special. (Side note: In high school, we may have started school at 8 am or 7:30 am and thought nothing of it. But something mysterious happens at college, where a 9 am class seems like the wrath of a liberal arts education…)
Step 7: Arrange classes by day so you know which ones to shop. All the Monday classes in one area, ordered by start time. Group concurrent classes together so you know you can only spend about 20 minutes in each.
Step 8: Compare lists. This is where things get exciting. I usually email all my closest friends to see what they’ve got and share mine. Sort of like trading Pokemon Cards, Magic Cards, baseball cards, etc. but better. Sometimes, you get amazing advice and come upon classes you would have never known about otherwise (despite how thorough you’ve clearly been).
Step 9: Await first day of classes with a fiery passion. But wait. Reassess. It is only July 9. Summer is rocking. (Also, more realistically, make sure you know which classes you have to apply to/preregister for so you don’t freak out last minute).
Step 10: Enjoy, relax, put the list away until you get back on campus. Job well done. Job well done.