Let’s face it. Those who say love is found when we’re not searching for it are right. So then, I wonder why so many of us repeatedly dress up to go to the bars and parties while actively searching for a mate on the dance floor. Some great relationships can actually be made in the classroom, when we’re wearing sweats, answering questions completely wrong and stuttering during presentations. There’s a good chance that our study buddies could soon become our bed buddies, and our lab partners could later become our life partners. Too far? Maybe, but it certainly seems that Syracuse University has our love lives in our best interest when graduation requirements are established.

Lab science
Unless you were a super geek in high school and aced the Advanced Placement test for chemistry, you’re probably required to take a lab science. They’re almost always more difficult than former students say they were, so you basically feel like you’re going through earth science hell until grades come out and you discover the volcanic-sized curve the professor decided on. But the positive of these lab sciences is the lab part. Labs are like good blind dates. You are randomly matched up with a partner, you have the same goal, and you share the same hatred toward being stuck in a room for three hours. Soon enough, your mutual complaining will bond you two together and you’ll start purposely screwing up your fingerprinting in order to spend more time with one another.

Writing intensive
Writing intensives are the awful required class many of us are forced to take against our wills. Since writing intensives are required by every school and major, the classes become one big melting pot. Here, you’ll find drama queens, physics punks, Newhouse know-it-alls, undecided hippies and sport management studs all together in one small class taught by a serious, studious or seriously strange grad student. Exotic is usually sexy, right? Isn’t that why we go abroad? Try to think of writing intensives similarly. Majors other than our own can be pretty exotic, too.

Language
For those of us who were forced to take language classes, we know how depressing they are. Not only are they usually way too early in the morning, but they are four whopping days of the week. That’s right, four. But, romantically speaking, these classes can be great (except for the fact that classes are almost entirely female). Sharing four lovely sunrises together each week while speaking broken Spanish can be quite magical if you think about it. Language classes are like young love. You do many childish activities together, you cheat off one another, you tease each other for calling the squiggly thing above the ‘n’ a dildo instead of a tilde. But I guarantee that you never forget your foreign language classmates and, if you’re in Spanish, the phrase ‘Yo no se.’

PED classes
Gym classes in college take flirty middle school dodge ball to a much higher level. Here, we can flirt in tight yoga clothes or in bathing suits while snorkeling or learning CPR. Definitely try to take some physical education classes while at SU. Since they are pretty much just for entertainment, you are bound to meet some sexy singles to amuse all semester long.

Humanities/social sciences
These classes provide us with the opportunity to explore one another in some pretty risqué ways. We can choose to study anything from human sex to queer history to family sociology to religions to art and philosophy. Professors often force us to participate in these classes, lest we sacrifice the 90 percent of our final grade designated to participation. We reveal our deepest feelings about sex, our alcoholic uncle, even the beauty and morality of pornography. Hearing our hot peers expose such intense thoughts and have such heated arguments in class is quite invigorating, especially if you continue to keep that heat well beyond the classroom.

Electives
Personally selected classes are where we can really shine. We usually choose electives about subjects we’re passionate about (or at least slightly interested in), and we’re usually pretty confident and knowledgeable about our passions. So when you get two passionate students sharing a passion for their passion, they’re bound to become passionate about one another. Isn’t that like the Pythagorean Theorem?

Talia Pollock is a junior television, radio and film major and the relationship columnist. She is still unable to rationalize anything positive about math classes. You can reach her at tpollock@syr.edu.

Published on April 5, 2010 at 12:00 pm