Stephanie Bachman

 "I’ve had three hour conversations about religion with an Atheist, and I think a Pagan, at the same time. I also had conversations about politics, real discussions without yelling at each other and listening to each other’s opinions, which is great!"

-Stephanie Bachman, Second Year Student, Sociology and Physics Dual Major

Hey everyone! I apologize for the slight hiatus. Believe it or not, even bloggers have a life. Especially when they happen to be college students with quizzes and tests that they have to worry about. My reasons for the lack of update aside though, I’ll get into how I encountered the latest face of I.U.P.

The subject of this interview is actually someone that I have frequent contact with throughout the week since we’re a part of a similar association. I asked her if she’d be willing to take part in an interview for the Faces of I.U.P. blog, and she agreed kindly. We met up Saturday evening at the Fireplace restaurant after she had gotten off work. We grabbed a couple of slices of pizza and some bread sticks.(Which since she had extra meal-swipes she needed to use, she got them for me.) I conducted the interview as we ate our dinner.

The subject of the interview didn’t have to wait for me to ask her what her name or major or anything else. She knew the routine. “My name is Stephanie Bachman. I’m a second year student, I don’t like the term ‘sophomore’ since I’m technically a junior by credit. I’m dual major in Sociology and Physics. I’m from Media, Pennsylvania.”

She paused for a few moments to think. “How you got to I.U.P. is usually your next question?”

“Yeah,” I said, nodding in confirmation as I took a bite from my pizza.

She thought for a few moments. “Well ultimately I think I picked I.U.P. because I fell in love with the Honors College. It was between I.U.P. and Penn State, and I was having trouble picking. I liked them both- but after visiting I.U.P. again and touring the Honors College, it just felt more and more right. It felt more and more like it was where I belonged. I like the size, it’s not too big. It’s a little far from home- but yeah. I love the Honors College, the size, and the people. Yeah, that’s how I came to I.U.P.”

“You said you were originally considering Penn State?”

“Yes,’ Stephanie confirmed.

“Why were you considering Penn State?”

“Well part of it is because my brother goes there, he’s actually going to be graduating there this May. Part of it is because it has a great astronomy program. They also offered a lot of majors, and at the time I had no idea what I wanted to do. I could switch so many times and they offered the program that I wanted to do. I.U.P. doesn’t offer an astronomy program or an astrophysics program, so I’m dual majoring in Physics so I can go to the right graduate school with a Physics degree even though it’s not the ideal program. Yeah Penn State is a good school and everything, it was just too big. Sometimes I wish I had gone there. My life would be completely different if I had went there. I.U.P. is where I’m at.”

“How did you get into a Sociology and Physics dual-major?” I asked her.

She shook her head in annoyance, and an irritated smile crossed her face. “I hate that question! Everybody asks me that question as soon as I tell them what my major is. The answer is that I was originally a Hospitality Management major, but I decided that wasn’t right for me. I just knew I had to switch to something else. I switched to Sociology, I’m in the Human Services track since I want to go work for Non-profits and help people make a difference. That felt more right to what I wanted to do with my life. I was still unsure about what I wanted to do- I could see myself do Physics. I thought that since I have time to dual-major, so I’m going to get both degrees and see where life takes me.”

“What would you do with the Physics degree?” I asked.

“Ultimately two things. Get a Masters in Astronomy, and/or Astrophysics. Or I would work for an international non-profit, and use my Sociology degree to get into a non-profit where I can travel and teach in third-world countries and teach internationally. Yeah, I don’t quite know. We’ll see.”

“That would be pretty cool,” I said.

She nodded. “Yeah, I love to travel and I love to work abroad. I’d love to work where I can travel abroad.”

“I take it you’ve traveled abroad before?”

“Yes. I studied in China the summer after my first year here. I went to in the city of Shungdou with a friend and a few other I.U.P. students. We also visited Shanghai and Beijing. We did some sight-seeing, so I got to see that. We stopped in Germany too. That was only just on-the-way home kind-of-thing. But yeah, I can also officially say that I’ve been to Germany.”

“That’s cool,” I said, quite impressed. “How long were you in Beijing and Shanghai?”

“Between the two of them it was about a week.”

“What were you studying there?” I asked.

“Well it was actually an interesting experience where I.U.P had never worked with this program before. It was called the Emergent University program. They had no idea what it would be like- we didn’t get to pick our classes until the day before- it was an interesting experience to say the least. Especially when a lot of your classmates had picked all of their classes way in advance. I wanted to take some culture classes and I wanted to take some classes focused on Chinese culture. It was hard to pick classes in a couple of hours, and only having one night to do it. I ended up taking an International Cultures and Etiquette class. As well as a World Food class, which was called Public Gastronomy. I was trying to get my multi-cultural awareness class, so I’m hoping that those will count. I really don’t have time to take another one.”

“Was it a huge culture-shock being in China?”

“I don’t think I was there long enough for it to be a real culture shock. Some things were definitely surprising, but I have international friends and I have a friend from China. I’ve met other Chinese people, so I wasn’t too surprised. I wouldn’t go so far as to say it was a culture-shock.”

“Did you go in knowing any Chinese?”

“The only Chinese I know is ‘ni-hao’ and ‘xe-xe’ which means ‘hello’ and ‘thank you.’ I learned my numbers while I was there, but I kind of forgot them to be honest. After we got there we were put into groups, and they assigned two girls who knew Chinese, and they helped my friend, another kid and I. I was thinking during the plane ride that I should have started practicing my Chinese before I got there. At the same time I didn’t know I was going to China at the beginning of the semester, if I did I would have registered for Chinese 101 so at least I would have had a semester of Chinese under my belt. But it was too late to register for a class or anything.”

Satisfied, I decided to switch the topic. I wanted to see if I could find out how long she would be going to school having the two majors. “How long are you going to be going to school with a dual major in Sociology and Physics?”

“Just by the fact that I lost almost a year having switched majors, I’m still trying to graduate in four years. I’ve done two years now, and I’ll do two more. It is possible as long as the classes I need to take are available when they’re offered and there’s no time conflicts or anything like that. As long as I don’t get screwed over in scheduling. Plus I’m almost done with my Sociology degree. I have seven classes left in Sociology plus a summer internship.”

I nodded, and then decided to follow through on some questions I had been formulating during our conversation. “What do you like about the Honors College?”

“Everything! Except for the fact that they made me retake classes I had AP for, but that’s mainly because you can’t usually get around CORE. CORE is designed to help students take care of most of their liberal studies except for Math, and Health and Wellness. I love the set-up for CORE, we have small discussion-based classes. We have conversations in each class, and each unit tackles a question like, ‘What do you believe? What do you do?’ Or “What’s right? What’s bad?’ Each unit tackles it from a different perspective. If it’s an English unit you answer it from an English perspective. If it’s Philosophy you answer it from a Philosophy perspective. I love the whole thing about CORE credits.

“I also love the Honors College dorm building. I love the people in Whitmyre, it’s such an inviting place and it’s a wonderful atmosphere. It’s open, it’s friendly, and it’s safe and comfortable! I feel like I can be myself there. You can have engaging conversations there. I’ve had three hour conversations about religion with an Atheist, and I think a Pagan, at the same time. I also had conversations about politics, real discussions without yelling at each other and listening to each other’s opinions, which is great! That’s also what CORE is mostly about! If there’s disagreement we can have an honest and open discussion about it. We could have honest open discussion and listen to how they feel without getting aggressive or worked up about it.

“The people are so diverse as well! We can have all sorts of different thoughts and opinions, and we can live peacefully with one another.”

“Have you found any of your views changed due to being in the Honors College?”

She thought for a few moments, pondering her answer to my question. “I’ve definitely had a few of my viewpoints questioned, and I’ve questioned quite a few viewpoints myself. So I can say that there’s some issues where I’m not sure where I stand on them. That’s my thing, if I don’t know so much about something, and if I’m not very well-informed on a topic, I won’t form an opinion. I don’t want to form an opinion on something I don’t know enough about to have an educated opinion on. That’s the way I’ve felt for the most part. I’ve definitely had my eyes opened on certain issues and such since coming to college- not just at I.U.P., but classes outside of the college. The ones that are open to anyone, not just Honor College students. They helped me think differently about world.

“I kind of think that’s what college is mainly about, it's not so much challenging your views on the world, but opening your mind to it. College is a time where we as young adults are growing into ourselves and learning who we are and what we think. We’re supposed to critically think about issues, and that’s what college is about aside for training us for the job we want to do.”

Stephanie and I talked for another hour afterward. Once we had finished, we got up from the table, and we walked outside. Since we were heading in similar directions, we just walked until we had to go our separate ways. I thanked her for allowing me to conduct an interview with her, and we wished one another a goodnight.

I realize now as I am writing this that we have less than four weeks left. Which means that between now and then, there are still plenty of faces of I.U.P to get to know. Hopefully now that there are more people walking around I’ll have greater chances at finding those who’d be willing to sit down and partake in an interview. Guess we’ll see what happens.

Unfortunately we’ve come to the end of this post. Be sure to keep checking back though. There are still plenty of Faces of I.U.P. to get to know before this spring semester comes to a close. I plan on making sure to get them up here. Until next time, catch you all later!