Seniors Taking In The Pizza Dinner – Joe Klen ’97 and Mike Warren ’93 talking to the seniors

Another rite of passage at Wabash is senior comps.  That’s Comprehensive Exams over your four years in your major(s) and minor(s).  It’s sessions of written exams and then an hour of oral exams by three professors.  Yes, you have to pass comps to graduate.  No, the Grunge didn’t have to try multiple times – although he worried he might!

Last night the Offices of the Dean of Students, Alumni and Parent Relations, and Annual Giving co-hosted a pizza dinner for the seniors back for comps.  No program, no talks, just pizza, salad, and soft drinks.  They were finished with the written exams and the orals started today.

It’s an interesting time for the seniors.  A lot of pressure – to do their best usually and not to have an “opportunity” for a repeat.  Grades will be posted in february.  But it is also the signal of the beginning of the end.  All that is left after that is to finish the spring semester and get fitted for the cap and gown.  Oh, I might want to include get into grad school or get a job!

Right now they are all fired up to have this week behind them.  As winter becomes spring, it will dawn on them that their days here are numbered.  Student days including football games, theater performances, campus parties…and long breaks…will be over.  What lies ahead is more schooling or the real world of work.

Hopefully, they savor these few months left…when not shaving, flip-flops thru the snow, a winter coat and shorts, pajama bottoms in lieu of dirty jeans, are “normal.”

It isn’t easy but it is worth it.