Purple is my favorite color. It has always given me the sexy and mysterious impression. But my previous feeling of purple is refreshed by Northwestern University.
In Northwestern,purple is unassertive, but with the characters of its own at the same time. The studying atmosphere here is never too serious. Students here know when to buckle down to study and when to cheer for the Wildcats. The campus is moderate in size. You are able to both meet new people and bump into your friends. With the broad range of courses, the fast-paced quarter system, and the diverse programs and internships, students are navigating their four-year journey here. But with the gorgeous scenery of lakefront beach, the proximity to Chicago, and the plenty of extracurricular activities, learning experience is a much more immersive process that enables students to really build up a college life here.
But moreover, in Weinberg School of Arts and Sciences, purple presents more academic focuses of Northwestern that successfully meet my claims .
Purple is always associated with feminism. As I was nurtured in a virtually matriarchal family, living with my great grandma, grandma, and my mother, I have witnessed their legendary fights against social constraints to pursue higher education and better self-development. Addition to my three-year experience tutoring the adopted Tibetan orphan girl Nimalau, initiating donations for girls dropouts, and conducting researches on the psychological maladjustment of minority of orphan girls adopted in metropolis, I have accumulated my academic interests in women's studies and realized that i need to take a more substantial educational path. In this aspect, the Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences meets my academic and personal expectations perfectly. Here in Weinberg, I can participate in the Gender Studies Program, which offers professional courses and programs on all related topics on sexuality studies. In class, I can get in-depth and comprehensive understanding feminism, from queer studies to female writing, from the women's movement in the 70s to the "Indian Women in a Global World"; outside of classroom, I can expand my focus to include wider perspective on sexuality studies, such as the social labor division and gay and lesbian studies, and I can participate in the Society of Women Engineers and Women's Center to enrich my daily experience of the knowledge I learn. Upon the learning in this "dynamic, interdisciplinary program that draws upon faculty and courses from more than twenty departments", I believe myself to have a brand-new and all-sided acquaintance of women's studies!
Purple also can be linked with the warmth of humanities and social concerns, which I find in the Kaplan Humanities Scholars Program in Weinburg. Throughout the "challenging year-long journey through the humanities", students in this program have opportunities to take interdisciplinary courses of history,philosophy, literature, arts appreciation and so on. While confronting the opuses of great authors and artists such as Aristotle, Kant and Plato, following the leading steps of the outstanding professors from different departments, and attending various of out-door acitivities such as field trips and class performance, students can see through the wisdom words amassed in the long history of human society to form a wholesome outlook towards world, life, and values. Before deciding where they are heading to, they can get a clearer self-understanding and more definite answers to their previous doubts. Such a "true" learning experience is just right for me, a student who spent her junior school years wondering about "the ultimate questions". Plus, according to my research on Chinese youth's spiritual state, Chinese heavy curriculum and stiff examination system have pushed us to overly pursue pragmatical skills and high scores. Learning is increasingly losing its pristine joy of those critical thinkings and wise talkings. That's why I realy want to take a rest from the inculcation and start to absorb the fundamental knowledge of life from Kaplan Humanities Scholars Program. I believe that through learning in Kaplan Humanities Scholars Program, I can form a positive vision of "good society", which I can then contribute to!
Upon my glancing over many websites of American universities, the delicate purple school badge of Northwestern impresses me the most. Maybe I have interpreted the meanings of "purple" in a subjective way; maybe the founder of Northwestern simply favored for no reason, but I would really like to contribute to the enrichment and development of this university, and its purple. I want to know what mark that I and this university can combine to leave on this world. Would it be purple too?
