What I Learned in College
A detailed review of my Vassar transcript 28 years later
As I prepare to turn 50 soon (yikes!) I thought it would be fun to do a detailed review of my college transcript, which I found recently while going through some boxes. In my post on the liberal arts I promised I would do a follow-up article on the current crisis in the humanities, but there are so many catastrophic problems there that I am postponing that one until the fall. This will be a personal essay about what I actually remember from my college classes in the mid 1990s. The transcript I found dates from August 30, 2002 when I was applying to grad schools and bears the Registrar’s seal across the envelope flap to prevent … that infamous early aughts forgery technology that everybody knows about? No idea, actually, but if the Registrar thought it was important that’s good enough for me.
Some ground rules. I will go through the transcript mostly in chronological order, but I took several year-long (i.e. two semester) classes and in those cases I will treat both semesters together. I will give the course name, department if unclear, my grade, the number of credits (which my college called units; there is a very boring explanation of this on the back of the transcript), briefly what I remember about the course’s academic content, and any funny anecdotes that I recall. In the interest of privacy I will not name any of the professors. I learned a lot outside of the classroom too, but that is beyond the scope of this post which will focus just on the transcript.
Some biographical data may prove useful. I attended Vassar College from 1993 to 1997 and was awarded a Bachelor of Arts degree with a major in Latin on May 25, 1997. My GPA was 3.39 and I did not once, in the entire 4 years, ask why I had received a particular grade or attempt to negotiate a higher one. In the following 10 years I spent a total of 4 years in graduate school (not all in a row) in 2 separate fields, one in the humanities the other in business. Grad school will also be outside the scope of this post.
Also, since we are discussing memories from over 25 years ago, I will disclose that I was doing a lot of drugs at this time. For marijuana, I definitely did above average use; alcohol, probably average to slightly below average use; occasional psychedelic use; and very rarely a few others things that I will not mention because I have not fully researched the statute of limitations.
The first part of the transcript indicates 5 transfer units, 1 from high school Advanced Placement American history and 4 from my junior semester studying abroad in Rome. As per its policy, Vassar counted the credits but not the grades. I have literally zero recollection of the high school AP class. I will very briefly discuss the study abroad credits in their chronological sequence, but the actual grades are on a Stanford University transcript which I cannot find; they are roughly in line with the Vassar grades.
Freshman Year
Elementary Latin. Units: 2. Grade: A (both semesters) I entered college with zero Latin and did not declare it my major until my sophomore year (my parents wanted me to be an English major). I wanted to take Latin in high school (where it was offered as an elective) but there was some scheduling conflict so I couldn’t. I eventually came up with better reasons for wanting to learn Latin, but definitely the main initial reason was that I owned some Dover edition reprints of early modern witchcraft-related books (Malleus Maleficarum, Demonologia, etc.) with untranslated Latin footnote citations that I wanted to be able to read.
I evidently did very well and went on to study postclassical Latin in grad school, so this class was a big success.
Calculus/Discrete Mathematics. Units: 2. Grade: A (fall), B+ (spring) This was the one class that my parents required me to take. My math at the beginning of high school was pretty bad but by the end it had gotten pretty good but only up to the pre-calc level. I did reasonably well in this class, but the two main things I remember have nothing to do with calculus. First, Fermat’s Last Theorem was proved on June 23, 1993 and I’m guessing on the first day of class (late August 1993) the professor showed us the front page New York Times article about it. He was absolutely beaming and ecstatic. The second thing is that the X-Files series premiere was September 10, 1993 and the professor would spend quite a bit of time at the top of each class talking about the latest episode … quite a bit!
History of Philosophy. Units: 2. Grade: B (fall), B- (spring) This was a survey course from the pre-Socratics to either Kant or slightly later. I’m honestly not sure why I didn’t do better here. I got really into philosophy in my senior year of high school, especially Frederick Copleston's A History of Philosophy, but I guess not up to Vassar standards for a better grade?
English 101. Units: 1. Grade A- (fall) I have zero memory of this class, which I assume was required and intended to teach people how to write academic papers. I was already an excellent writer back then so I can only assume that I skipped many sessions and did minimal work for it.
Medieval & Renaissance Legends (French). Units: 1. Grade A- (spring) As with all the French classes I took, this class was entirely (the lectures, the class discussions, the essays) in French. I took French all four years in high school so it was pretty easy. I do not remember exactly what we read, but I’m guessing plenty of the Song of Roland, Ronsard, du Bellay, that sort of thing.
Republican Rome. Units: 1. Grade: B (spring) As I recall this was basically a history class cross-listed with the Classics department. I’m guessing my grade wasn’t higher because I was more focused on learning Latin, but I honestly do not remember a ton about this class and I studied Roman history in much more detail later.
Sophomore Year
Elementary Greek. Units: 2. Grade: A- both semesters This was the hardest thing I studied in college. I’m actually amazed I did as well as an A- because my ancient Greek is very bad, although I like to say I have more Greek than Petrarch, who had none. Although not exactly related to the class, I do remember the Classics department had (has?) an annual event of reading aloud (in translation) the Iliad and the Odyssey in alternating years; I was in the audience and completely lost my shit when the I heard the line “Achilles beat off the Trojans.”
English Lit to Close of 18th Century. Units: 2. Grade: B+ both semesters This was a survey course from Chaucer (should have started with Beowulf) to Johnathan Swift and Alexander Pope. I enjoyed the course a lot; not sure why I didn’t do better. The one specific thing I remember is that at the end we had to write something in style of one of the authors we had studied and I wrote something making fun of PC (politically correct) culture in the style of John Donne.
Ovid & Prose Authors (Latin). Units: 1. Grade: B+ (fall) Ovid is my favorite Roman author so I can only assume I enjoyed this class but I don’t remember a ton of specifics.
French Poetry. Units: 1. Grade: A- (fall) Honestly no memory of this course but I apparently did well.
Catullus and Vergil (Latin). Units: 1. Grade: A- (spring) I like both Catullus and Vergil so I’m pretty sure I enjoyed this course, but nothing remarkable stands out.
Intensive Elementary Italian. Units: 2 (but taken entirely in the spring). Grade: A- So by the spring of my sophomore year I already knew that I would be studying in Rome for the fall semester of my junior year. I had taught myself how to read Italian the preceding summer but I really wanted to have speaking ability even though that was completely optional as my (classics) program in Rome was in English. This class was a year of Italian grammar in one semester and I remember I had to get special permission because there was a time overlap with another of my classes, so I ended up missing about a half hour of instruction every week. Luckily Italian is extremely easy so everything worked out fine.
Junior Year
My junior semester abroad in Rome at the Intercollegiate Center for Classical Studies was my best time in college and tied with my grad school years in London at the Warburg Institute as the best time in my life. I will write more about it on another occasion, and since I don’t have the Stanford transcript handy with my grades I will just list the courses here and move on.
City Archaeology and Topology
Renaissance and Baroque Art History
City History and Civilization
Advanced Latin
Crosscurrents in French Culture. Units: 1. Grade: B+ (spring) Not a ton of memories about this one. Probably contemporary French literature of some sort?
Latin Literary History. Units: 0.5. Grade: Satisfactory (ungraded class, spring) This was a so-called “reading course.” Half a credit, no grade, no lectures, just reading (Latin in my case) and some informal discussion with the professor. I do not remember which authors I read for this class, but if I had to gamble I would say Ovid.
Intro to Number Theory (Mathematics). Units: 1. Grade: Pass (spring) This was the second hardest class I took after ancient Greek. I believe the entire class except me was math majors. Vassar let you take one class on a Pass/Fail basis and so I used that option here and evidently passed. One thing I remember was that on the exams, when you had to write proofs and explain your reasoning, the professor had instructions to write your explanation in clear English or (I think he meant this as a bit) in clear French or German and I wrote mine in French.
Fundamentals of Music. Units: 1. Grade: C+ (spring) So Vassar’s intro to art history year-long survey course is famous and I regret not taking it. Because I had studied art history the previous semester in Rome I was eligible to take more advanced art history classes, which I did in my senior year. I decided that instead I would take the corresponding year-long survey of classical music class in my senior year, but it had a prerequisite: this fundamentals of music theory course. This was my worst grade in college, but in my defense the class was primarily intended for music majors and also I’m bad at music.
Senior Year
Intro to Music History. Units: 2. Grade: B+ (fall), B- (spring) This class was excellent. I knew essentially nothing about classical music before college and my main goal here was to not be a complete fucking moron on the subject, so mission accomplished! My grade in the spring was a little rough but it was my last semester and I was kind of checked out mentally. I also had friends who were jazz musicians/aficionados all during college so I kind of received an entire parallel education about jazz outside of the classroom, but as I said I’m trying to stick to the transcript.
Senior Project (Latin). Units: 1. Grade: Satisfactory (ungraded class, fall) This was my thesis or dissertation; I forgot the exact terminology used. I honestly did not do a great job. It was pass, fail, or pass with distinction and I passed, but by this time my interests were shifting more to Renaissance and Baroque history and art history and so I kind of just phoned it in.
Latin Lyric and Elegy. Units: 1. Grade: A- (fall) I want to say we read Propertius but I honestly do not remember.
Beginning Ballet. Units: 0.5. Grade: Satisfactory (ungraded class, fall) Yes, I took ballet. The main thing I remember was getting a plantar wart on the sole of my foot and having it burned off with dry ice which hurt so much!
Baroque Art History Italy, France, Spain. Units: 1. Grade: B (spring) This was a good class. I remember writing a paper on Poussin’s Rape of the Sabine Women at the Met. I do also randomly remember, in a different paper, calling Simon Vouet a “minor artist” and the professor strongly objecting … maybe that’s why I got a B?
European Art History, 2nd Half of 19th Century. Units: 1. Grade: B (spring) This was a course on Impressionism. It was fine, but I really do regret not taking that intro survey course.
Latin Mythology and Religion. Units: 0.5. Grade: Satisfactory (ungraded class, spring) Another reading course, no memory of what I read. Again, I was pretty checked out at this point.
Physics, Tour of the Subatomic Zoo. Units: 0.5. Grade: Pass (spring) I think I took this to fulfill a science requirement. It was definitely entertaining, but I kind of wish I had taken a more rigorous physics course, but there’s only so many hours in the day (unless you approach the speed of light, in which case time goes slower so that c is the same for all observers).
I graduated with a modest amount of debt (then went a little overboard on that front in grad school) right in the middle of late 90s dot com bubble and almost immediately entered the tech industry as a computer programmer with no formal qualifications. Within 5 years I was programming risk management software for DTCC, the organization that handles trade settlement for US equities markets. My grad school adventures may or may not inspire a future post. I worked a variety (understatement) of jobs in finance, tech, and publishing before quitting in 2018 to pursue acting, comedy, and writing. All in all I received an excellent undergraduate education at Vassar. Would recommend!
