A Delicate Balance

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For those of us caught in the thick of the unrelenting stress of the workaday world, it’s common to hear co-workers and colleagues nostalgically reflect on their college years, remembering them as a carefree time of friendship, fun, and folly. We envy the easy flow of college life that we suppose students enjoy and imagine them lounging on overstuffed couches, reading a book underneath a shade tree, or contemplating Aristotle over a cup of cappuccino. Boy, do we have it wrong.
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In this installment of Class, our series about Rice undergraduate life, we pull back the curtain and give you a glimpse of what academic life is like for today’s students. Though college life may be fun, exciting, and rewarding, Rice’s strenuous academic curriculum is no cakewalk. For the sophomores featured in this story—Adaba Briggs, Will Conrad, Jennine Guanchez, and Marc Ridilla—finding that perfect balance in their academic lives is a complex juggling act.

When we first met these students, they were busy adjusting to new surroundings and to people very different from those in their hometowns. Will is an Austin native, but the others come from far away. Adaba was raised in Africa, Jennine calls Florida home, and Marc is from Pennsylvania. As would be expected, the adjustment to everything associated with the beginning of college life at Rice was somewhat of a struggle.

That was then. Now our students have a year under their belts and have moved one step closer to their ultimate goal: a Rice University degree.