As Dean's Date approaches, many students are ensconced in their favorite study spots. Some pick a table in Firestone's C-Floor atrium, while others commandeer a classroom in Frist Campus Center or lounge on the front lawn of an eating club.
The most difficult challenge, students say, is finding a good spot in a popular study space or a place that is open late at night. After dragging a dozen books, a laptop and perhaps a few cans of Red Bull across campus, the last thing any student wants is to trek back to his room.
Dorm rooms are the least desirable place for many students to study. "I can't get any work done [in my room]," Irene Moskowitz '09 said from her room.
Even if her roommates are not there to distract her, Moskowitz said the lure of her bed can be tough to ignore while engaged in stressful work. "I can't work in my room even when there's no one here," she said. "If I feel tired, I feel like I have a license to go take a nap, which is always a problem."
So Moskowitz, like so many others, looks for other places to work.
But Frist is too distracting, she said, too crowded with people studying or just hanging out. "The people Cafe Viv, the study tables they have on weekday nights — I can never get any real work done [there]."
Firestone, in her opinion, is also too crowded.
Moskowitz, nonetheless, has found a favorite spot: the Chancellor Green Rotunda, which she discovered during her freshman year when she had a class in East Pyne. With its stained-glass windows and intricate hardwood floors, the rotunda, she said, is a "bright" place where she can get her work done.
"It's pretty and quiet and it has desks and also couches depending on if you're writing a paper or reading," Moskowitz said.
Though Moskowitz can't get work done in Frist, her friend Ralph Schaefer '09 said he enjoys the quiet of the long rows of study tables on the 300-level.
Quieter than the 100-level, which is within earshot of the big-screen TVs tuned to CNN and ESPN, the 300-level tables are usually empty during the semester. During reading period and exams, the 300-level often gets crowded, Schaefer said, in part because it is a quiet space in close proximity to the many sources of food in Frist.
Sayuri Jinadasa '08, who has tried many study spaces during her three years on campus, used to work in Frist classrooms or study rooms in Bloomberg Hall. But now that she lives in the junior slums, the trip to Bloomberg seems far, especially given the risk that the study rooms will already be occupied. Securing an empty classroom in Frist is difficult, Jinadasa said, and Firestone "kick[s] me out too early."
Since being disappointed by her preferred spaces, Jinadasa has retreated to her room. "Because I live far from study spaces, it's annoying to carry the stuff I need, so I've become [lazier]," she said.
While her room may not be the ideal place to study, it suffices. "I like to do stuff in isolated rooms, but [studying in my room is] better than lugging my stuff around and finding out there isn't space in the spaces I want to study," she said.
For Jinadasa, the best option would be to have quiet spaces that are open all the time. "If there were more 24-hour study spaces, that would be much nicer," she said.
Another junior, Lauren Wang, remains satisfied with her study spot options.
Over the last three years, Wang has studied in an array of campus spaces, from her room to clean Butler bathroom counters to couches in foyers.
"I go to a different place for every project," she said, adding that she decides where to study depending on her mood. "I work where I find I'm productive," she said.
Her only requisite is space, as she enjoys spreading out her things. "When I study, I move around," she said.
For her Chinese courses last year, Wang found a couch outside a classroom in East Pyne, where she studied with her legs elevated above her head and draped over an armrest.
"I think I memorize characters better when I'm upside down," she explained.
She also recommended the study area in 1942 Hall, explaining that "1942 is a good place to go if you're desperate because it's so dank and stale that there's nothing to do but work. There's no incentive to procrastinate."
"There are so many places to study on this campus," Wang said. "I like the ones where [there aren't many] people. On the third level of Frist, you look up and you see 30 people studying, and that's just really depressing."
She added, "I don't like looking up and seeing rows and rows of stressed faces lit by flourescent lamps."
Next year, while living in Pyne Hall, Wang anticipates shifting her studying farther west, perhaps to the Forbes College library.
"I've used this campus to its maximum potential," she said.
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