{"id":9916,"date":"2017-11-01T08:09:03","date_gmt":"2017-11-01T12:09:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/social.rollins.edu\/wpsites\/letters\/?p=9916"},"modified":"2019-07-29T20:42:22","modified_gmt":"2019-07-29T20:42:22","slug":"happy-first-day-of-school","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.rollins.edu\/letters\/2017\/11\/01\/happy-first-day-of-school\/","title":{"rendered":"Happy First Day of School!"},"content":{"rendered":"

Happy first day of class! Well, I guess that it\u2019s more like happy midterms at Rollins. For me, the first day of class was just a week ago. The Israeli semester runs from October to January, because it starts after the Jewish new year! This is good because it meant I had a 5-week fall break between my language intensive and the actual semester, but it also means I really don\u2019t get a winter break. But who needs winter break when you are going from a Mediterranean climate to Florida anyway?<\/p>\n

My classes here at Tel Aviv University are both interesting and relevant to where I am. I take a Hebrew class every morning at 8:30, which is not always easy but I am able to speak, write, and comprehend at a much higher level than when I left for Israel. My other classes focus on the Arab-Israeli conflict, as well as the collective memory and the effect that the trauma of this conflict has had on the population. I am even taking an Israeli Cinema course where we watch a popular film every week and then discuss how it relates to the culture and ideology of Israel. One thing I have realized though is how important the small class size at Rollins really is to my education. Because I have to take my courses in English, my classmates range from other study abroad students to students obtaining a bachelor\u2019s degree in English through the university, and students in the master\u2019s program. My classes have about 50 \u2013 70 students, and the teaching style is more lecture based. I think in terms of studying abroad, the size and teaching style of my class never really came to mind like it did when I was applying to college in the first place. It\u2019s not bad by any means, but definitely something I have to get used to.<\/p>\n

The best part of my class schedule is that I only have class Monday thru Thursday. This means I have three days to explore and travel every weekend. This past weekend, I hiked Masada and floated in the Dead Sea, and spent Sunday shopping in Geula in Jerusalem. Because I was fortunate enough to go to Europe over my fall break, I am spending most weekends in different areas of Israel and the Middle East.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>The crazy thing is my semester just started and I only have two months left! How is this even possible? Israel actually feels like home. It\u2019s a different feeling than Rollins-home and a different home than Georgia home, but I have grown to love Israel and everything about it.\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Happy first day of class! Well, I guess that it\u2019s more like happy midterms at Rollins. For me, the first day of class was just a week ago. The Israeli semester runs from October to January, because it starts after the Jewish new year! This is good because it meant I had a 5-week fall…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":469,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[38],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9916","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-tau"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.rollins.edu\/letters\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9916","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.rollins.edu\/letters\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.rollins.edu\/letters\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.rollins.edu\/letters\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/469"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.rollins.edu\/letters\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9916"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.rollins.edu\/letters\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9916\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14413,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.rollins.edu\/letters\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9916\/revisions\/14413"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.rollins.edu\/letters\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9916"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.rollins.edu\/letters\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9916"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.rollins.edu\/letters\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9916"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}