Coolest Classes I’ve Ever Taken In College

I was inspired by Cassie’s post on the Classes You Should Take in College, so I decided to make a spin-off post on the coolest classes I’ve ever taken!

I was apparently really hellbent on committing complete and total academic suicide from the day I first set foot at Davis. I think I gave the school a good run for its money, as I ended up taking over 100 classes in my 4 years there and graduated with almost 300 documented quarter units. (I say “documented” because there were a whole lot of classes that I took for no credit, back when I was worried that they’d cap me at 225 units. You technically only needed 180 to graduate.)

Coolest Classes I’ve Ever Taken In College

Piano Lessons

This was actually the reason why I ended up double-majoring. I found out that music majors got free instrument lessons, so I figured…why the hecks not? I could multi-task!

My super-spiffy senior recital poster.

Looking back, I don’t really know how I managed to balance everything anymore, because I was also an officer of two clubs, working a couple jobs, and volunteering all over the place at the time. :x (And I still had friends! :O Very understanding ones.) I wouldn’t have gone back to change anything about the last two years though; I loved every second of it. <3

Environmental Effects on Human Performance

The effects of thermal, barometric and gravitational conditions on physiological function and physical performance of humans. Acute and chronic effects, emphasizing physiological adaptations and limitations, will be studied.

• This was taught by my favorite professor of all time, and we got to do all kinds of crazy labs using each other as our test subjects. :D As such, we all got to be very uncomfortably comfortable with each other.
• We tested the effects of extremely hot/humid conditions, extremely cold temperatures while submerged in water, simulated altitude, air pollution, and breathing different mixtures of gases on exercising and stationary individuals. (Our test subject held his breath for 5 minutes + 47 seconds on the CO2 mixture. :O ) I volunteered myself for the Hypothermia lab and froze in a hydrostatic weighing tank while another girl exercised on a cycle ergometer in the tank with me.
• If you’ve read part of my life story (heh), you’ve no doubt already seen the picture below. This was actually a side study for the Breath Hold lab, where we monitored fluid shifts in test subjects submerged in warm or cold water. I’m smiling because I didn’t have to freeze again. :P We got to analyze my blood afterward! (And my urine volume. Like I said, uncomfortably comfortable.)

Gross Anatomy

Detailed study of the gross anatomical structure of the human body, with emphasis on function and clinical relevance to students entering health care professions.

• Dr. Gross (aptly named, yesyes?) taught both the anatomy courses for med students and undergrads. I adored this class. He makes up 1/3 of my favorite science professors of all time (the other two being Dr. Shaffrath & Dr. Paul) and is an amazing human being. Aside from teaching us, he also worked as a pediatrician at UCD Children’s Hospital, did research, volunteered abroad every year and helped out in disaster relief efforts (e.g. he was in the first team of physicians that went to Haiti after the earthquake), and still somehow manages to spend a lot of time with his family (which included 3 foster children)! I aspire to be as accomplished as him someday.

Chamber Ensembles

• As per DavisWiki (an amazingly awesome site/resource that you should totally visit if you happen to be a student at Davis, or even if you’re just visiting)…
  This is absolute truth, especially where our class was concerned. Our professors said they’d never seen such tight-knit group before or after our class graduated.
• We still try to get together once a year (whenever possible) with all our professors to hang out and be awesome. Back in the day, I often [willingly] got roped into chamber ensembles with my friends, so our “class” was to just play music together and perform something at the end of each quarter. We’d go out for food afterward for “team bonding” (aka excuse to hang out and eat food together).

Blue Polo Day (a Music Department holiday, also known as yet another excuse to hang out with each other and eat food). There is definitely a trend here.

Exercise Biology Lab

• This was another super fun lab where we basically ran all kinds of tests on each other! I got to find out my body composition with my friend, the hydrostatic weighing tank (I was a very avidly enthusiastic volunteer test subject), and we ran a whole host of other tests on each other. I have a horrendously laughable vertical leap.
• In the chart below, Subject 1 was a male friend of mine who was about an inch taller and 30 pounds heavier. I’m Subject 2, and clearly not cut out for aerobic excellence, but there lies hope for me as a power athlete! I think I may have accidentally worked out legs the day before the Wingate (poor life choices). We got to choose our own motivational theme songs for it, so I went with Survivor’s Eye of the Tiger. :P I’d love to see how much/if it’s changed much in the past couple years, since this was done when I’d pretty much just started lifting weights.

Horseback Riding

• Being the poor/frugal college student that I was, I happened upon the Equestrian Center’s Work Exchange Program, where you volunteered 4-6 hours of your time (depending on if you wanted group, semi-private or private lessons) each week in exchange for “free” lessons. I love horses, and would’ve volunteered there for free anyway, so it was a done deal. I managed to do this for one summer (because I actually had some spare time; no way!) before all the rest of my classes started up again.
• They liked me enough that they actually offered me a legit job by the end of the summer, but sadly, I couldn’t take it, because it would’ve turned my 14-15-hour days into 17-hour days. :[ Budget cuts suck, and the center has far fewer horses than they used to. Also, the WEP no longer exists. :[ (This is why I try to jump at every opportunity I find/am given.)

This is Emi! :D She’d come nibble on my elbow and/or my butt whenever I came by to clean her water trough.

Aerobic Kickboxing

• This was/is taught by Andrea, an amazing woman who teaches aerobic kickboxing, abs/back conditioning, weightlifting, and self-defense at UCD, and also happens to be a professional bodybuilder and freelance fashion designer. She is probably at least partially responsible for my dreams of badassery and my survival of my [one and only] half-marathon.
• Even with my distinct advantage of having the equivalent of a supersuper-senior’s registration time, it was still somewhat nervewracking to see whether or not I’d get into the course. (Junior year and on, I always did.) Her classes were intense, but I loved every second of the pain. (It hurt so good!) She’s an awesome teacher, extremely knowledgeable, motivating and inspiring. <3 Here’s another piece that someone wrote about her!
• Khoo-isms: “Andrea Khoo’s wristwatch has no numbers on it. It just says, ‘Time to kick ass.’” / “My favorite Mama Khoo story is the one where she got hit by the car…and then continued on with her run.  You should have seen the car.”

Archery

• During my senior year, I was trying to maximize my opportunities in taking the many PE classes UCD had to offer, but they unfortunately didn’t always work with my schedule (no surprise there, since my schedule was always a block of text). I took Andrea’s kickboxing class in the early morning and would speed over to my Sports Psych class across campus (thank goodness for my bike).
• Every morning, I’d rush into Sports Psych 4 minutes before class started with my backpack, a huge bag of food, a gym bag, a bow and a quiver of arrows. I’m sure I made a lovely impression with Dr. Paul–but at least I wasn’t late! Sports Psych would cut into 20 minutes of archery, so Jenn (basketball coach + archery teacher) made me a “guest TA” so I could still be in her archery classes. :D There was one day where the entire field was shrouded in fog and she had us advance on the targets as though we were planning an ambush. Twas pretty awesome.

Beginning Tumbling

• This was taught by the gymnastics coach, and in case you weren’t aware before, I love gymnastics. :D It is probably the one and only thing that I’ve ever truly and completely sucked at, but still very much loved. This gave me a chance to keep it in my life a little while longer, and how can someone turn down doing flips into foam pits?!
• I managed to take this once in my sophomore year and the rest in senior year, but somehow, the coach remembered my name. I take this to mean that I was either really, really good, or really, really terrible. I definitely was not any good, so…(…sigh…)

Horses For Healers

• I actually took this one in grad school, and since I’ve written a whole separate post about it already, I’m gonna direct you there!

This post brought back lots of happy memories. <3 Stay tuned next Sunday for all the classes I wish I’d taken! :P

What are some of the coolest/most interesting/fun classes you’ve ever taken?