It’s 10 minutes to the top of the hour. The professor is at the tail end of lecture, students are packing up their things, and the next class is already streaming through the door, effectively hindering the current class’s ability to exit.
After three years of half-running to class and limping through the door dripping with sweat just as the professor begins class, this eagerness to get into the classroom is rather hard for me to understand.
It would be nice to chalk it up to a voracious appetite for academia, the need for those few extra moments to gather one’s composure before the invigorating lecture to come.
Or perhaps everyone is vying for that one prime seat, the desire for a perfect lecture experience overcoming any inclination of consideration for the exiting class. Or maybe as residents of Los Angeles, we have all become so accustomed to congestion that we can’t help but recreate the 405 unnecessarily in an academic setting.
Whatever the reason, stampeding into class before the previous students have left just creates more problems than it solves. No one enjoys being in a tightly packed mob of strangers who, let’s face it, probably haven’t showered today and are at best mildly sweaty.
However, instead of waiting that whole entire minute for the doorway to clear, after which one could walk freely ““ and without contending with the aroma of a mass of dirty college students ““ into class, students find the need to test the capacity of classroom doors. Maybe we all just didn’t get hugged enough as children, but we could all probably find more constructive physical contact elsewhere.
So let’s all do a little experiment. Try resisting that urge to pile on top of your fellow students to get through the door one minute faster.
It would probably make the act of switching classes more efficient, less unpleasant, and we would all probably smell a little better. Also, it will significantly decrease the chance you will get a notebook thrown at your face.
Pope is a fourth-year American literature and psychology student.