What does NSOP stand for?

Good very, very early morning, everyone! I just got up to squeeze in a trip to the gym before getting down to work, so this will be short and sweet. (No point in getting up at 6am after only 5 hours of sleep if I don’t get work done, right?)

Today, we’re going to talk about NSOP, the New Student Orientation Program. Two things: 

1) You pronounce it “Enn-Sahp.” I don’t know whose idea this was, but so it goes :) 

2) You may be thinking that you’re not going to choose a school based on its orientation program. And I think you’ve got a pretty solid point there. But do remember that little things like this—how schools run big, non-academic programs—say a lot about the atmosphere of the school. I’m sure that by now you all grasp how important that is.

So about this NSOP. How about a list? Those are good, right? Quick to write, quick to read, so you can get back to studying for looming APs? Yes? Ok, onwards!

1. NSOP is a University-wide program, so you get your first taste of the oft-discussed Barnard-Columbia relationship. In general, it is a little more separated than real life, but it does offer a decent approximation: we have our own groups, but they are analogous to those of the CC (Columbia College) students, and we meet up for lots of events on the other side of the street.
2. You will be busy! Everyone’s big fear, once it finally comes down to moving in, is that you will find yourself lonely and homesick, suddenly not quite the grown-up you felt yourself to be. Don’t worry: you are very, very unlikely to have the kind of time necessary to cultivate those unpleasant feelings. NSOP is a whirlwind of mandatory meetings—this is how program filing (class registration) works! this is how you reach Public Safety!—and super fun outings and events, ranging from group dinners to book discussions to Broadway plays.
3. You will be assigned to a couple of groups (led by Orientation Leaders, your RA, etc.), so you will have plenty of organized opportunities to bond. Go forth and make friends! They come in handy later.
4. There are outings. Go on them. These are trips to various cool places/ neighborhoods around New York, and they are an amazing opportunity. Not only are they tons of fun—friends, food, your last days of sun!—but they are a fabulous chance to actually get to learn about NYC. It gets very difficult, after the semester is under way, to make time to venture downtown, so now is your chance! The leader will give you lots of information about the history/ current reputation, but you will also have a lot of time to explore on your own. Also, this way, when family comes to visit and you panic, thinking the only neighborhood you know is Butler Library, you can draw on these outings for inspiration.

NSOP seems long, but it flies by. Before you know it, you will have learned the Barnard basics, and you will be free to join my giant pile of unread books and me in the library. I’ll be in the Reference Room, 301.

Ok, gym. Latin. History…I must go now, but please be in touch!

Chloe

Making the most of NYC

Midnight view of Manhattan from the Brooklyn Bridge

A huge draw for me when I was considering Barnard was its amazing location – who wouldn’t want to live in one of the most exciting cities in the world for four years?!  However, for me (and for a lot of the prospective students I speak to) this is also a point of concern.  Many students worry that the pull of New York City would be hard to resist.  And when the sun is shining and your friends are going to hang out in Riverside Park and you know you really should start on your Women in Culture paper, sometimes it can be hard to drag yourself to the library.  However, most semesters I found myself wishing I had taken advantage of the city more than I did.  Campus life itself is so fun it’s often easy to forget the wider world outside Barnard’s gates.  Luckily, you all can learn from my experience and go exploring more often than I did!

Here were some of my favorite things to do in the city while I was a student:

View of the Financial District  from the Staten Island Ferry

Field Trips: Classes at Barnard utilize the city as an extended classroom.  As an art history major, I visited museums and galleries in nearly all of my classes.  Friends in Environmental Science collected and tested water samples from the Hudson; my first-year seminar went to the opera.  There’s no limit to the things you can learn from New York City, and Barnard professors make full use of it.

Urban New York: Each semester, students can participate in Urban New York drawings to win free tickets to various New York City events.  Concert tickets, sports tickets, theater tickets… you name it.  I got a ticket to something each time I participated.  You can also buy discounted tickets to many city-wide events through the Columbia University Arts Initiative.  I tried to see a show at least once a semester, and rarely paid more than $30 for my ticket.

Eat: Most of my babysitting cash went directly to various restaurants around New York City.  After a long day, I would occasionally treat myself to delivery Indian or Thai food (you can get basically any type of food you want delivered directly to the Barnard dorms).  Weekend nights often revolved around an adventure to try a new type of food – dumplings in Chinatown, Korean BBQ, Indian frankies at Roti Roll on Amsterdam Ave.  Absolute Bagels (at 108 and Broadway) was a Saturday-morning must. 

Treats from Smorgasburg in Williamsburg, Brooklyn

Boating in Central Park

Parking: Spring in New York is my favorite time of year (although winter with the lights on College Walk is a very close second).  People emerge from their apartments like they’ve never seen sun before in their lives and the parks are crawling.  Sheep’s Meadow in Central Park was one of my favorite weekend outings, and during the week I would often run in either Riverside Park or Central Park.  In a time crunch or on a weekday afternoon, Lehman Lawn at Barnard is a perfect spot to read (or in my case, read for 5 minutes and inevitably fall asleep for an hour).  A picnic blanket was my first purchase once I got to college, and it got a lot of use over my four years.

No matter where you go to college there will always be things you would rather do than your calculus homework.  But if you’ve gotten this far, you know how to prioritize, and why in the world wouldn’t you want to be at a school with the world’s greatest distractions?!

Melanie :)