Is It History?
In case anyone thought it might be over… no. Dylan’s course registration took yet another turn.
I was sitting around, being outraged by text book prices (which are, of course, outrageous), when I thought, I could probably find these books online for way cheaper!
In fact, I can find these books online for cheaper – sometimes. The one book that was particularly bothersome was Dylan’s book for The Theatre Experience – the exact same class I’d convinced him to take when he was trying to reschedule his Entertainment Industries class to take “another section,” as instructed by the generic email.
The book for The Theatre Experience cost $78 in its cheapest form – and had to be the most up-to-date version, meaning we couldn’t buy any of the thousands of used texts available because the newest version had just been published in 2019.
For $78, I thought, this had better be the best textbook on the planet. To make sure, I clicked on the digital sample online, to see what the book was like.
It was history.
Or at least, it looked like history to me. As I was browsing, I saw things like “Theatre in the Renaissance” and “Asian Theatre.” I nearly gagged. I kept thinking about Dylan saying, “Is it history?” when he registered, somewhat unhappily, for the class. Dylan really doesn’t enjoy history.
Nearly in the same breath, I started looking for options. There were three classes available at the same time as the theatre class – two of which he would love, but only one that would fulfill any kind of requirement. Not coincidentally, the requirement was a history class.
So I shuffled some things around in my head, and made an additional list of about 16 classes he could take if he just shuffled his schedule.
And then I took my lists to Dylan.
“You can still take Theatre,” I said. “I just wanted to warn you that it’s a history class with a $78 text book.”
Dylan’s eyes were lit up as he stared at one option on the first page – the one option that did not fulfill a requirement, but could be taken as an elective and possibly count toward his minor.
The class is called Digital Musicianship 1.
It’s the kind of class that Dylan has been trying to teach himself for six years. It’s explores digital music techniques and technology, among other topics. But it has one drawback: there was a prerequisite.
“You have to take this other one-credit class, or get permission from the instructor,” I told him.
“I’ll get permission,” Dylan said, without blinking. He went straight to the computer and sent an email.
Three days later, Dylan was enrolled in Digital Musicianship 1.