Ask an Honors Student
- Michael Lang
- Hometown: La Conner, WA
- Major: Political Science, Economics, Philosophy
- Ask Michael at:
lang.mc@gmail.com
- What's best about Honors?
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Graduating with Honors is the ultimate feather in your cap. But what it represents is much more: Better quality classes due to smaller classroom numbers, an environment of engagement, books worth reading and friends worth making. Because let's face it, you only have about 3,000 more books to read if you finish one a week for the rest of your life. So you have to make them count. Honors helps with that. It also makes it easy for you to make friends in the early weeks of college-- a crucial social time that affects all four years -- because of your embedding into the Honors cluster at Higginson Hall. There are no limits to what friends give you.
- Your first Western "WOW" moment?
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Unsurprisingly, I had my first Western "wow" moment in an Honors class. It was HNRS 104 with Professor Margaritas, who is the living embodiment of an academic. He introduced me to to the book "The World as Will and Representation" by an eighteenth century philosopher named Arthur Schopenhauer. The book broke me open. I left lectures staring up at the sky, hungry for a subject I didn't know I was in love with. It really influenced my eventual decision to incorporate philosophy into my intended political science focus. The book was heavy-- not easy at all. But it helped me realize that the ease at which I could access a book was no match for the volumnous knowledge I could gain by at least the attempt. It's a book that's transformed the world to me, and continues to inform how I wonder at things.
- Outside the classroom?
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Outside the classroom I'm quite active. Honors teaches you-- perhaps subconsciously-- how to structure your time. And I didn't start out as an excellent time manager. It came through practice, and when I had become quite good, I began to fill my time with passions I love. I helped start a club called the Current Events Forum, which weekly brought together students and faculty to address the global issues of our time. I'm a guest columnist for the Western Front, and as often as possible try to engage the student body with issues that grab me. I'm also a community advisor, helping to foster diverse and inclusive relationships within residence halls around campus. I'm also an active Honors Board member, helping choose the seminars that are available to Honors students every quarter. I've also been known to campaign, to perform speeches in Red Square in honor of famous people and to bike downtown on sunny days. Boulevard Park is an especially good place for hot chocolate on one of Bellingham's trademark cold-but-sunny days.
- What is the best book you've read lately?
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"Why Nations Go To War" by John G. Stoessinger is a great primer on the major wars of the last century. Because it's a history book, it may turn many away, but because of its methodology, it's quite interesting. It specifically takes a look at history from what's called a "constructivist" approach, a very personal approach that analyzes the personal figures of history (Wilhelm II, Hitler, Stalin, Milosevic, etc) in a primarily psychological way. Simply put: it explains history not as a determined outcome, but as accidents arising because of the idiosycracies of each leading individual given his situation and present state of mind at the time. A very interesting take on world history. I would definitely recommend it.
- What is your favorite memory of WWU?
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The long, luxurious afternoons that my friends and I are privileged to enjoy at Larrabbee State Park. We even stayed there to camp one weekend, and I loved every moment of it. Staying up late watching movies in Nash Hall, or even enjoying a long dinner with the gang. Taking walks up into Sehome Arboretum when it's filled with snow or playing croquet across campus... That's what college has to be about, too. If the means aren't meaningful, the ends will never be fully fulfilling. The legacy will ultimately be the grades, but the memories will always be with the friends.