The following content is purely satirical and entirely fictional.
With spring semester fast approaching, it is important that we take the time to appreciate the most beneficial part of our Princeton undergraduate experience. It’s not the research experience, the elite degree, or the student-to-faculty ratio.
The best thing the University offers us is this two-week period in January where we learn skills that one would never think to seek out themselves and hear from speakers who were easily booked: Wintersession.
Let’s break down the word.
Winter: It is cold. And it is cold in Princeton.
Session: Classes. That don’t even count towards graduating.
What’s not to love? Where else am I able to watch a movie from the early 2000s on a large blow-up screen on the cold, wet ground outside the building where I failed my math exam?
Unlike our stressful academic classes, Wintersession courses allow us to learn for the sake of learning. Not for the sake of developing skills, accumulating knowledge, or making ourselves better people, students, or citizens in any way. We should embrace the opportunity to learn things so obscure and irrelevant that letting on that you remember them three weeks from now will make you look like a total dork.
Thanks to Wintersession, you can spend the next few months passing people you met in your courses on your way to class, not knowing if you should wave or say hi. You know they remember you, and you definitely remember them. (Uh oh, how long have we been making eye contact? Maybe I should just say “hi” and get it over with. Oh no, they have their Airpods in. Now everyone around me just watched me yell, “Hi!” to this random stranger, and they didn’t even say “hi” back.)
You just don’t get that same thrill from twelve-week-long classes.
Unfortunately, some students have to spend their Wintersession traveling to far-off places for free with their sports teams or performance groups. Those unlucky few miss out on the chance to attend all 70 knitting courses being offered or get mediocre career advice from people in fields they don’t really want to pursue.
A University report shows that the two-billion-dollar fall in the endowment is likely due “in large part” to Wintersession aprons and mugs. We think it would be worth another couple billion to bring in just a few more TikTok celebrities to show us how to cook meals in the residential college kitchens overrun by crusty dishes.
University Student Government (USG) has recently put out a referendum to make the semester two weeks in January and make the rest of the year even more Wintersession. We hope that this referendum passes so that we can spend all year learning anything and everything that has nothing to do with our majors.
Spencer Bauman and Liana Slomka are co-head Humor editors, and signed up for one Wintersession course between the two of them. It was a movie marathon.
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Mya KoffieThe Princeton Students Against Major Unacceptable Political Issues canceled their latest protest. Their Instagram post announcing the change read, “on account of low-speed winds and 40 percent chance of rain forecasted for this afternoon, we will no longer be congregating around the SPIA fountain. We hope for better protesting weather later in the month. Please stay tuned for new dates.”
The Princeton Students Against Major Unacceptable Political Issues canceled their latest protest. Their Instagram post announcing the change read, “on account of low-speed winds and 40 percent chance of rain forecasted for this afternoon, we will no longer be congregating around the SPIA fountain. We hope for better protesting weather later in the month. Please stay tuned for new dates.”
