The Blue Cut Fire raged in the hills to the east of my college campus, causing my coworkers and myself to be evacuated from our building as the roads became choked with evacuees from the Lytle Creek and Devore areas. We’re seated smack dab in the middle of these two towns, and the road we sit on is often a “short cut” when the traffic on the freeway gets nutty. So I got to head to school early to pick up a free planner (yay!) and tromp about in 111° weather (not yay), then grab a bite to eat before heading into my first day of class, which was…a mistake...

I had completely forgotten how crazy parking is on the first day of a Fall Semester. All parking lots were full and no one was leaving. Even though I had arrived early, I was late as I desperately circled the parking lots hoping to snag a spot. I knew I had to get in the class before roll was called. If I was not there at that time, my spot would have been given to a Waitlister. So I left my car in a 15 Minute drop off zone and hoped for the best.

The first class is Health, Safety, and Nutrition for Child Development. The class was packed, so I found a chair in the back and sat, taking my notes against my knees. Role was taken, and my spot was confirmed. Phew.

Our teacher went over the syllabus, which is a common occurrence for the first week of class, and went over some of the larger assignments and projects we will be doing. Our syllabus is available on Course Reserves, a website that is part of the school website that some teachers use to post all information about the class (however, this is different from the Moodle system, which is used for online or hybrid courses).

At some point, a Librarian came in and went over research and database information. Most of our new library additions are ebooks, and we also have access to a database of scholarly journals and publications, which is an immense plus (without it, if you wanted to use one of these resources for a paper, you would have to pay somewhere around $35 per article!). She showed us how to find keywords that will be used in finding research articles, a process that I will outline in a future post.

We finished the class tired, and I went out to find my car not only still there but free of any tickets. Certainly a win!

The next day didn’t bring a relief of the fire, which behaved erratically and forced many from their homes. We were able to return to work, but kept an eye on the fire line. My class that night was Philosophy/Intro to Religion, and I made sure to leave an hour early to get a parking spot!

This class ended up being my second favorite class mainly because our textbook was a $0.01 paperback, and we get to discuss different religions civilly. That doesn't happen enough.

Wordy but insanely affordable.

Friday night was four hours spent in Algebra, a subject I have taken before but like anything with gluten in it, doesn’t agree with me. This teacher was the first to go old school with actually using the blackboard and his syllabus was one whole page, while all the other classes provided a pamphlet. 

It was at this point it was obvious that the fire was affecting students too. The school put a plan in action to assist those who might have been displaced, including access to a food pantry and special resources. 

Saturday saw me in what is easily my favorite subject of this semester, Children and Diversity. Not only is there no book in this class (yay!) but it centers around issues that I personally take interest in: tolerance for all peoples. We delved right in with talks concerning racism, and explored the several intelligences that many psychologists believe define a person. I scored high in Intrapersonal, Spatial, and surprisingly, musical intelligences. We created name tags like you do in elementary school, and we explored children’s books that teach tolerance and how to appreciate the unique beauty each individual brings into the world.

A cute book. I will be reviewing this book and books like it in future posts.

By the time the first week of school was over, I had a free planner that I had plugged all my assignments into, and found myself a part of a very busy but manageable schedule. Predictably, parking spots became more available as more people dropped classes. 

The Blue Cut fire burned for a week straight. However, the fight still goes on for those who have lost their homes and property during the fire, and there are still plenty of animals that are displaced and in shelters. If you would like to help, please consider contacting or donating to one of the organizations at the San Bernardino County website.