Since today was the last lecture (for me, anyhow), for my biology class, I figured I'd might as well use it as an excuse to voice my enthusiasm for the Harvard Extension School. Honestly, I didn't think the class (second semester of first-year bio for pre-meds/bio majors) was as well-taught as the first-semester bio class I took while an undergrad, but it was still very well done. In particular, the teaching fellow who teaches my lab section is fantastic. Harvard Extension is generally just pretty good because the profs teaching the classes are typically post-docs (or perhaps sometimes even graduate students?) at Harvard, and they know their business, yet the classes are extremely affordable. I've mentioned this class to several people I know from many walks of life in Cambridge, and many of them have had similarly good experiences there over the years. Kudos to you, Extension School.
A few days back I posted about the last lab, which was embryo development in
zebrafish. I was telling my mom about how cool it was, and a day or so later she sent me a video of a mathematician/imager giving a
Ted Talk on human development. I finally watched it today and, apart from the guy using the word "divine" a bit too often, I must say -- how cool.
Next week, we have our last lab, and the following is technically the last lecture, but I will be in Indiana for a visit involving my middle sister's graduation. In fact, my original tentative calculation of 144 days in Cambridge may now be a little bit off, because I'm going home for a whole week... may have to fudge the numbers a bit, woops!
