Tuesday, October 1, 2013

Tuesday - Enrollment; Wednesday - B1 Deutsch, and a LONG Day

Yesterday, not too much happened. My main duty for the day (besides the normal busy morning) was to help a few students to enroll in the university. Brigitte held a session for Kettering, PPP, and another student, and I was tasked with guiding the students through the German enrollment paperwork, helping some of them register for the city, and helping get documents organized for the residency visa paperwork. Because there were not too many students, the task was enjoyable, and I answered as many questions as I could. I am becoming a pro at enrollment paperwork, registering within a German city, and residency visa information! 
While my Tuesday was not particularly crazy, my Wednesday was! We were only open from 9 a.m. - 12 p.m. today, but I was not in the office for about an hour of that time. I went over to building 8 to learn more about our StudierenPlus program - this program is a combination of Blackboard and DataVU. For those non-Valparaiso University readers, StudierenPlus is a combination of 1. a platform where professors can upload course content and announcements and 2. register for courses and workshops.
Learning more about this software from the content-producing side was interesting and informative. I am glad that I am getting this opportunity!
The rest of my morning was spent doing various tasks for people around the office. When my lunch break came, I realized that my work week was over (on a Wednesday at noon? That was weird!), and I had only my first German class separating me and my weekend in der Schweiz.
After my lunch break, I ended up running into Dawn, who was also taking the B1 German class in building 4 with me. We walked there together, getting there only a few minutes before class was to start - there was no one in the classroom. Not one person. So, we sat down and waited.
As the time wore on, a few more students trickled in. In all, there were about 8 of us, but still no professor. 15, 20 minutes came and went, and another student decided to go ask the international office what was going on. Karin ended up coming over to the classroom, informed us that our professor was here and ready to teach, and went off to find her.
Apparently there were two schedules, both with a different room number, and half of our class, as well as our professor, were in another room! They came to us, and 45 minutes after our start time, we actually began.
It was a wonderful experience. It is so good to be back in the classroom and learning the German language. It reminded me of middle school and high school when I most enjoyed learning the language! I think this class will be a partial review, but that is exactly what I need. 
The class is only once a week, but it is long. We are in the classroom for over three hours. The time seemed to go pretty fast, but by the end of that time period, I was ready to go home. 
Once I got home, I had to eat dinner. This was a little difficult, as I really need to go grocery shopping! Since Amy is coming tomorrow and I will be out of the country for over three days, I tried to not buy anything that could go bad. I ended up eating some leftovers that were in my fridge and just made it work. 
Tonight was the first time that Dawn got to meet some of my international friends. Everyone was hanging out on the 6th floor in Wurm-Haus and we decided to go to CaRe, the on-campus bar, for a little bit. Overall, a long, but wonderful day.

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