I'm a freshman we all make mistakes, but the first two weeks of school, I seemed to make a lot more than your average frosh.
We can skip past the time I waited at the quads for half an hour on Livingston for a Rex L (a bus that never stops at that bus stop). Or the time I took a bus to Cook/Douglass from College Ave instead of going to Livingston. Or the countless amount of times I had to uber to class because I just underestimated the population of people trying to get to the same place as me.
Today we're here to talk about the add/drop period. A simple phrase that gives anxiety to students across all campuses but makes me laugh every time I hear it.
As I pulled out my laptop to view the plethora of courses Rutgers University has to offer during add/drop week, I flashed back to orientation when all of the advisors encouraged all of the freshmen to take a FIG or BYRNE Seminar. The voices of encouragement echoed through my ears as I scanned the wide selection of interesting topics that can be learned through this easy one credit class.
As of right now I am an undecided major but am taking criminal justice and psychology. For my FIG seminar, I was hoping to take philosophy. I excitedly scrolled down to the P portion of the FIG selections and eagerly added it to my course schedule. A class on Wednesday at 3:20 became the newest addition to my schedule and I was ecstatic to be taking it.
On Wednesday at 2:55, I excitedly hopped onto a bus to Busch campus and skipped up the stairs to attend my philosophy class. History has always been one of my favorite subjects, as well as philosophy, but that course was never available in my high school. So I'm skipping up the stairs two at a time at this point and dreaming of how woke I can be learning about Plato and Aristotle.
By the time I was at the top of the stairs I was out of breath and also lost. But I found the classroom labeled 220 and walked right in.
The first thing I saw upon entering was a giant chalkboard with the word "pharmily" written on it in white chalk.
I immediately looked up to the front of the classroom to ask the professor if I was in the right spot and if this class is for philosophy. When she answered no I apologized for being in the wrong classroom and proceeded to walk out. Before I was out of the door, she stopped me to ask me what my name was to make sure I wasn't on her attendance sheet. I gave it to her, still eager to leave and attend my philosophy class and was halfway out the door when she looked up to tell me that my name was on the attendance list.
I looked up at the chalkboard again and saw the word pharmily... pharmacy family...
I took a pharmacy class by accident. I looked around the room to view my new family, a diverse selection of pre-med and pharmacy students.
Me. A psychology major who purposely avoided taking any type of science like chemistry or anatomy, was now sitting in a pharmacy fig surrounded by future doctors who I now had to consider my pharmily.
I couldn't help but crack up at myself because there's nothing more me than this story. I clicked pharmacy instead of philosophy on the course website and was unable to even consider dropping it because the last day to drop classes without a withdrawal on my transcript was Tuesday, and now it was 3:20 on Wednesday.
At this point, I sat down in my seat, front and center of the classroom as the rest of the class continues to laugh and I laughed with them at my luck.
Knowing that there was nothing I could do to drop the class I decided to make the best out of it and was so glad that I did.
It wasn't soon after that my accidental pharmacy class became my favorite course on my schedule.
The first day I came back, I received an email from my professor thanking me for my positive attitude despite taking the wrong class and told me that she had numerous friends in the psychology department and criminal justice department if I was ever struggling and needed help. This was only the first day and I felt as if she was already my pharmily.
Every week after became a fun engaging learning experience in my pharmacy class in room 220. I learned life skills that I never would have acquired before and we were lucky to have guest speakers on numerous occasions who talked about career skills and life advice. We were able to tour the pharmacy building and see simulations along with different labs. During other weeks we learned how to write job resumes and how to format emails to participate in research studies. We took career tests and wrote goals on how to reach our career goals. The class size was intimate and was full of engagement along with fun group work every week.
My pharmacy class introduced to me really cool friends, exposed us to experienced knowledge through guest speakers and taught me a lot about not just pharmacy but different career paths and life. I never asked to get adopted by a pharmacy class, but it happened on accident and I've never been more grateful to be part of the pharmily.
