Studying on gameday seems to be near impossible each time I try to do it. It seems like half of the typical study spots are closed, and the other half are tourist destinations. By the time I’m actually able to sit down, I’ve lost a lot of the time I set aside for studying.
Moody Library is usually my first choice. It’s within my walking distance of my apartment, it has Wi-Fi and a Starbucks, and I have access to all of the research materials the library offers. However, even with all those benefits, studying at the library doesn’t seem to be worth it when alumni and their families are gawking at me like an animal at the zoo when they stop in for coffee or want to see how things have changed.
I can imagine it’s exciting to see how different your alma mater is from when you were in school, but this is still a place of learning for most of the people on campus – even on game days. Show your Baylor pride and explore campus, but please be respectful when I’m trying to study for my midterm or write an essay by not bringing your entire family for a tour of the library. Here are the books, here are the computers, here is the stressed-out college student in her natural habitat – please move along.
I’ve tried using the private study rooms in the library to avoid the excited (but very distracting) football fans. The plain walls, small desk and uncomfortable wooden chairs don’t exactly contribute to the creative juices needed for me to get my work done, so studying there is no longer an option for me.
After running out of options for places to study in the library, I tried studying in the Paul L. Foster Business school.
I hoped the business school would give me a comfortable balance of activity and privacy. It’s closed to non-business majors on game days, but because everybody knows at least one business major (and if you stand by the front door long enough, someone will let you in), I was able to get inside and try to study.
I wasn’t thinking that visitors would be doing the same thing.
The new business school is shiny and new and absolutely worth a walk-through for students and alumni alike. The meeting and conference rooms are a state of the art and excellent places to work and study alone or with a group, which is what drew my interest of studying there in the first place.
The open concourse area was crowded. A few business students were studying and working on some last minute assignments (as I intended to do), but again, the ridiculous number of alumni and their families walking around were a distraction.
I wanted to use one of the business school’s smaller meeting rooms to study and soon discovered all the conference and study rooms were locked. A friend who happened to be there told me those rooms are only for business majors and even they have to swipe their Baylor ID to gain access.
Business minors don’t have access and neither do non-majors or minors taking a business course. I don’t fall under any of those categories, so I was left with (yet again) no place to study.
Common Grounds is a another great place, located off-campus, to study. It’s within what I’d consider to be walking distance, but on game days at Common Grounds, I can hardly hear myself think. The weekend already attracts silo-goers and other tourists, but game days are an entirely different beast. The entire place feels like a five-star truck stop with people constantly coming and going.The line doesn’t ever seem to end, often extending out the door. I’ve learned to avoid it completely, unless I’m willing to wait in line for half an hour to get my coffee and then scour all over creation trying to find a place to sit.
Those who live in dorms probably don’t have any more luck than I do finding a place to study. When I lived in a dorm, the study rooms had been repurposed as bedrooms (I hear that is still a common occurrence) and the common areas were great pre-tailgate meeting points filled with laughter and excitement, but absolutely horrible places to study.
Now that I live off-campus, I try and make my apartment a study-free zone. It’s my Batcave – my Fortress of Solitude, my safe place. It’s the one place I can go at the end of the day and separate myself from the work and studies that stress me out. Since I spend a lot of my time away from home, it also means that I get to really enjoy being home when I’m there.
So when I’m forced to study at home, I carry the stress that comes with that into anything else I do at home that day/night, and that’s not fun.
I’d like to be able to study in the library during game days without the distraction of alumni and their families touring the facilities. That way, I can be productive, but still enjoy the perks of gameday when I’m done. If I am going to be forced to study somewhere else on campus, I’d at the very least like to have access to those facilities.
