<p>The book that was assigned "Let the Great World Spin" by Colum McCann. Is there information somewhere on if there is something due before they arrive? I keep asking my son and he has no idea.</p>
<p>The kids have been getting emails from Father DeCola asking them to blog about the book on the Class of 2016 web page. But my son said it’s voluntary.</p>
<p>Yeah. I saw that email …basically a bunch of slackers is what he almost called them…LOL…</p>
<p>The blog is voluntary, but I think all freshman are supposed to read the book. It’s common for universities to require all freshman to read a chosen book, which is then discussed during orientation. At the college where I teach this year all students are reading the play “Proof.” I read the Colum McCann book this summer myself out of curiosity.</p>
<p>Tell your students to do the work and get to know Fr. Vin well…he’s awesome and really helpful especially when it comes to helping the first years cut through some of the bureaucracy that is Fordham!</p>
<p>Out of curiosity what bureaucracy are we in store for?</p>
<p>Unfortunately, sometimes being at LC means there is an extra layer of problems bc some things are handled at Rose Hill. AP reports were one of those things and Fr. Vin personally got involved when my S didn’t receive his 24 AP Credits. I am pretty sure that he went across the street to College Board to get them and it was done immediately. Much better than you have to talk to this person…no, you have to talk to this person…no, you have to order and pay for a new report and oh yeah, that might get lost, too!</p>
<p>Fr. Vin also happens to like Theatre majors and was quite helpful with some scheduling issues and registration for the Spring semester my S’s freshman year.</p>
<p>ResLife, FA & Billing have their own issues that seem to require a little time speaking to different people to sort things out. Right now, my S is involved in an appeal over a judicial fine for signing someone in and not signing them out on time…problem is my S didn’t recognize the name of the kid they said he signed in and doesn’t want to pay the $30. It remains to be seen just how much time he will spend challenging it!</p>
<p>Just adding that everything my S has asked for within these departments has gotten done timely and to his satisfaction (other than the pending appeal which may well have been resolved and he didn’t tell me), it just requires some effort in dealing with different people and different departments and that is what the students “lovingly” refer to as the Fordham bureaucracy.</p>
<p>We are having issues with the financial aid office. Everytime we call, we are told something different. Now they are fining us over $300 for a late fee, even though we fixed the problem (our fault, something was on the wrong line in the taxes-- sigh-- ) as soon as we found out about it. We will be appealing that. Everything went smoothly last year but this year has been very irritating.</p>
<p>That sounds like the problem we had, in which my daughter was billed $1380 extra (suddenly, weeks after we paid her tuition) for having too many credit hours-- including a late fee because the $1380 was not paid before the due date,which was three days <em>before</em> we received the supplementary bill. </p>
<p>After a bizarrely circular conversation, Student Accounts finally advised me to call Father DeCola, who took care of it (theater majors are supposed to get a credit override.) I wonder how many parents would have simply paid the extra charge.</p>
<p>I did speak with him because Con was out of the country during registration. He mentioned that there was a glich with some of the credits coming up to many and him having to manual adjust.</p>
<p>He seems like a very nice man.</p>