Learner (who is less than 12 hours away from taking his last final of the semester) and I were talking earlier today, marveling at how the past ten days have felt like a year and a minute at the same time. It seems between then and now, he has somehow successfully met all his deadlines without failing anything (at least to the degree he knows), and he's now fighting his desire to blow off this last exam and declare the mid-semester holiday officially begun.
Life on a seminary campus this time of the semester is quite interesting. For instance, Learner has certainly noticed fellow students becoming more sociable with each exam taken. As a result, Learner and Mrs. Learner have enjoyed some added time with others this weekend, though it's been a bit tricky as they themselves are not completely finished with their exams and have had to weigh their extroversion with their need to study (surprisingly, their need to study seems to have lost).
Another observation regarding a semester's end is that it's very difficult to talk about anything non-school related with others as everyone seems so overwhelmed by their building academic pressures. Learner hates this, but confesses that he fell into the trap more than a few times, both out of a habit-forming as well as a conversational necessity kind of way. In other words, one can try to bring up other topics of interest, but no one seems to have many others at this point in the semester. This, Learner thinks, is both understandable and sad.
Personally, the last 6-7 weeks (for it really has been crunch time since the beginning of November) have been good for Learner. He tends to function well under deadline and the need to focus, and does even better when everyone else is making a bigger deal of things than he himself normally would. Sure, he's given to extremity in terms of processing at times, but that gets held in check when someone else is being more ridiculous than he would even be.
Regarding his grades for the semester, here are his predictions:
- Greek in Exegesis: B-/C (yes, believe it or not, he should pass)
- Preparation and Delivery of Sermons: A
- Theology of Prayer: A
- Covenant Theology: A-/B+ (depending on his paper)
- Spiritual and MInistry Formation: B-/C (depending on his paper and the exam he takes tomorrow)
All in all (and considering he's still married and his four children still recognize and love him as their father), not a bad first full semester.
For my part, I give him a B- for making it through, for dealing with some issues head on, and for being liked by many and respected by most. That said, he still has room for improvement in terms of his devotional life (i.e. finding and having a consistent one), his use of time (particularly earlier in the semester when everything is not "due"), and his friendships with friends and professors (not thinking himself a bother in interacting with them).
So yes, all in all, not a bad first full semester. As soon as the grades come back, I'll post them here and we'll see how accurate Learner's evaluation really was.
