University in France

Wednesday was a difficult day because it became very apparent that I could not carry on with the Spanish courses I had selected!  The level was just too hard.  So, I found myself all of a sudden without 10 credits!  It has been so frustrating and an awful amount of work to sift through the course options and scheduling and to try to find what works.  I've pretty much given up trying to find classes that can serve as the pre-requisite courses needed for my winter term at Laurier...they just don't exist!  Now having to remove some courses and find something else in their place, what a job!  Then contacting profs to explain why I missed the first week and seeing if there is space in the class.  Then collecting work missed.

Then there is the matter of exams.  Haven't even got to figuring that out fully yet.  French university classes are made up of three types of courses: Lectures (Cours Magistraux, or CM), Labs and Tutorials (Travaux Dirigés, TD, and Travaux Pratiques, TP--I haven't figured out the difference.  I tried a TD and a TP required to make up one credit in Level 2 Oral Spanish, and their formats were more or less the same.)  Attendance at the TDs and TPs is important because they are smallish and you are evaluated in these courses throughout the term.  Apparently, they do not have a final exam in the exam period.  The CMs, on the other hand, are big and there is no ongoing evaluation.  There is just one big, scary exam at the end that apparently a lot of people fail.  So much so, that there is a scheduled exam make-up time!  Now, the final exam time isn't until January, but my term at Laurier begins right after New Years and I have a flight home right before Christmas.  So I have to figure out how to write the exams for the two CM classes that I have (good thing it's only two and my other seven classes are all TDs).  Both of the profs were nice enough, but don't really know how to arrange it.  I think I have to talk to the "secretariat".

These two classes also have an online component, but I am unable to access it because I am not registered!  And no one can register me I guess!  My go-to people are the International Office (who definitely don't do things like that) and my Pedagogue Coordinatrice...I figure that's like an Academic Advisor.  And she's great; even replying to emails on the weekend or in the evenings, but lots of times, she can't do anything!  Apparently, I need to talk to the secretariat for that online thing too!  And on and on it goes.  :S

On Thursday, I arrived at school to discover the main entrance blocked by mounds of cardboard boxes and thought, here we go: my first example of a "manifestation", that is, a demonstration--something French university students are apparently notorious for.  I followed others arriving to another entrance, but once inside, the halls were also filled with boxes.  I asked someone what was going on and they said that it was a game.  To get to class, we had to help move the boxes further along the hallways.  I heard later from others that it was a demonstration, but I am not convinced because there wasn't really anything being said except, "Move the boxes along.  Come on people.  Get to it."  At least that's what I think they were saying!