I have been feeling inspired by my Model United Nations (UN) class lately and I can honestly say that I have personally learned a lot and enjoy the challenges my class brings. I feel that it’s been a different experience and that I have gained new knowledge from it. But all in all, my Model UN class, has nothing to do with my major, what I want to do in life or is what need to graduate. So why am I taking a class like this? In fact, why take any class that you feel will not impact you as a person or apply to your future?
We have all been there. We have all been faced with an elective that doesn’t interest us or maybe a filler class to get credit or maybe we are “forced” to take something against our will because whatever school or program that we were working towards says it is “required”.
For example, we all had to take a foreign language of some sort because otherwise we wouldn’t be at Virginia Wesleyan College right now. And for those of us who were not bilingual, it was certainly a challenge. However, I remember hearing people in my class complain, saying that no one speaks the language at home so there is no way they will retain it (I would tell my mom this when I got frustrated with the past, present and future tenses in Spanish). Some students would complain because they just knew that they wouldn’t speak this language again.
For me, my Math Analysis class in high school was the ultimate struggle (mind you that I am mathematically challenged). I struggled in that class every day for a whole three months and to this day I have no idea what that class taught me. My teacher always told the class that this will apply to our lives someday and that Math Analysis really does help you through life. When I heard my teacher say that, I couldn’t understand how that was possible. What purpose did this class serve other than to give me constant stress or headache?
The classes we do not like for whatever reason somehow come back around. Sometimes our most boring or most difficult classes can actually make it easier for us to understand a concept of something in the future. Or maybe our agonizing experience in a class has made us just stronger as a person. Even that foreign language that you took in high school isn’t so bad after all when you meet someone who speaks the language and you actually remember a few phrases so you can dialogue with her for a moment. You never know how life can bring things back around to you again. But you can be sure that it will one way or another.
In my opinion, no class is useless. Even if you learn one concept from it I believe that concept will still better you or may make you think differently and even challenge you in a way you never thought it could before. As for my Model UN class, I know that there are so many different concepts that this class can teach me including peacekeeping, working with others, healthy debating and public speaking. So the next time you believe that a class will never apply to your life, think again.
Taylor Boyd
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