Poison Ivy

The summer internship search has begun at Wharton. It's not called job-hunting, it's called "recruiting." It's like we're ten years old again and picking teams for a dodge ball game and everyone is secretly hoping they won't be the last person left. What an awful process. I want a recruiter that picks their interns with the same approach Herb Brooks had for hockey. He didn't pick the best players, he picked the right ones. Crazy? The US Olympic Committee certainly thought so. In the end, he pulled off the biggest upset in hockey history in a game we now refer to by one noun only - miracle.

Somehow, I think I'll have a hard time convincing a UBS recruiter that my lack of 4.0 is analogous to beating the snot out of the Russians.

Since I'm pretty sure I'll end up unemployed and living out of a box in a few years, I have decided to write a book. I'll post it chapter by chapter, and feel free to leave comments (even mean ones.) So here it is, the introduction to Poison Ivy, by Elizabeth Schneider.

Introduction:

I believe you should give credit where credit is due. This book would never have existed without one rather special writing instructor of mine – Kristine Bender*. She was my inspiration. She inspired me to prove her wrong. Indeed, Poison Ivy is my personal salute to the University of Pennsylvania and their worthless writing requirement that taught me absolutely nothing about writing: Cheers.

To begin my tale, I guess I should start from the beginning, it’s a very good place to start (or so I hear.) When you read, you begin with A-B-C. When you go to college you begin with “regurgitate this information on the next test and you will get an A, or maybe a B, or maybe a C.” At least, that is how the writing program is structured at Penn. I understand the need to study different forms of writing. However, I don’t think following cookie-cutter outlines is effective way to learn how to write. Enter: Kristine Bender, a graduate student on a power trip with a no-nonsense curriculum, and you have a very spicy recipe for conflict.

It was the perfect storm of ingredients. As a freshman I was naïve enough to believe that I could help a teacher see the error of their ways and stupid enough to pick a fight about it. My argument was grounded on the principle that forcing students to write in a pre-packaged, outlined form doesn’t help them to develop better writing skills. Instead, it makes them master imitators, purely parroting the teachers’ wishes. The following example is not the first time I clashed with Kristine, and certainly wasn’t the last. The assignment was simple enough; write a narrative with a moral. While writing I came across a roadblock. Great thinkers have been arguing about morality since the beginning of time. If they hadn’t come up with a solution, I didn’t see why I had to.

So, I wrote a narrative about one of my many less-than-perfect actions. Then came the one moment, the climactic sentence, the part where I would assert my moral superiority - the part that I never wrote. Instead, I concluded with, “There is no neat, gift wrapped ending to this tale. Instead, I leave the lesson for you to ponder, discard it as rubbish if you please, or find your own meaning within it. The end.” I thought it was a mature way to end an unrealistic assignment. Kristine thought otherwise. My essay got a C - for “… failing to meet outlined objectives.”

So in part, this book is motivated by revenge. This is for Kristine Bender, who constantly told me, “No, you can’t.” With this work (and my middle finger straight up) I say, “Watch me.”



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