02.14.05
Thesis topic sign-ups
Monday, February 7 was the Communication Department senior thesis sign up day.
The Comm. Dept. does thesis sign ups in a way no other department that I’ve heard of does. Other departments have you propose a paper, which then gets approved, or there are categories, and you write your order of preference and are assigned according to your preference.
The Comm. Dept. is more egalitarian, I suppose, but the method ends up being a little strange. They announce topic choices ahead of the sign-up day, with the list of required classes for each one. There are a maximum of 16 slots per topic and only 10 topics. Topic sign-up is first come, first serve, starting at 9 a.m. What this ends up meaning, is that people queue up early, really early, for the topic they want. Some people camp all night.
Since I am a two year senior, I had done this last year. Last year I showed up at 5 a.m, and was perhaps number 30 in line. Two had camped all night. My plan had been to sign up for Video Capstone, but angle it toward a broadcast journalism capstone. Video capstone was a hot topic, but the hottest one that year was Gender and Communication. The list and the waiting list for that topic filled quickly.
Close to sign up time, my advisor showed up, and I went to consult about my plan. He told me to sign up for Journalism Capstone instead, and chided me for showing up so early. So I signed up for Journalism Capstone, and wait-listed Video Capstone as a back-up. He was right about not needing to be early. Four slots remained empty.
So this year I decided not to worry. Lisa, the department office manager kept asking me if I was going to camp out again. It was somewhat annoying. I didn’t make it in before my first class, so I wandered into the office between classes. Lisa seemed a little annoyed that I was so late. She rather tartly informed me that this would be the biggest class of seniors yet. Surprisingly, Journalism Capstone had filled up, so I signed up in the 3rd slot on the wait list. Video Capstone on the other hand had 3 slots empty! So I signed up for that. I’m not sure I’ll get to do the journalism emphasis for my video project, but we’ll see.