Disclaimer: This is a part of our satirical Shallot series. All content is unbelievably fake.
Once a class reaches week seven, it has typically hit its stride. Students are locking down for tests and setting up final projects.
So when a brand-new, unknown student popped up in a sociology class (SOC 231: People) of 50, he had the intention to see if he could watch humans interacting with a new variable.
“I’m just here to observe,” University senior undeclared student Kyle Jefferson said. “Sociology classes are just so captivating, but after a while, you need a new high.”
Jefferson was in this class as an attempt to observe — in an innovative way. Jefferson won’t get any credit for the assignment; he said he’s “just here for the experience.”
“I might like to try majoring in sociology at some point. I don’t know. I’m just here to observe,” Jefferson said.
According to the sociology department, most students didn’t notice a disturbance by the suddenly out-of-place student.
“I hope he found something interesting, because that was just our class,” junior Sarah Tyner said. “Nothing was different.”
University researchers in various fields are investigating the potential of applying this kind of study to other sciences. This includes testing the pressure and air quality of winter classes in 150 Columbia Hall, 180 PLC and the Living-Learning Center’s lecture hall.
“If we get where we’re going with this plan, we might be able to just go ahead and do journalism assignments on journalism assignments. … Writing projects on writing projects. The innovation demonstrated by this student and his peers have lifted the scales from our eyes,” said Todd Parker, University associate professor in general studies. “The sky’s the limit for this new frontier in University studies and, well, studying.”
Parker and his colleagues are currently in the process of getting signatures to petition the University for a new department: the Department of Study Studies.
Early candidates for participation in the department include sociology, philosophy and anthropology.