ArticlesOpinionPoint - Counter Point

Grades PCP

Written by: Maryanna Sophia Landaverde

Point: My Roommate Is to Blame for My Failing Grades

By Kimberly Gresham
Communications Major,
First Year

I just cannot believe the tragedy that has befallen me. I failed my first ever final, but the blame cannot solely be laid on me. I experienced slings and arrows of outrageous fortune on the day leading up to the faithful exam. Truthfully, this is a problem that has its roots in something further than a single day: Agatha Walker, my roommate. If she had simply fulfilled her duties as MY roommate, this calamity could have easily been avoided. Alas, that did not occur, and now I am in this predicament. This stain on my record will invade my mind and plague my thoughts. I am utterly infested with this cold, dark sadness, unable to enjoy my first-class flight home to my family for the holidays.

Agatha’s tasks as my roommate are not difficult or even much. They are certainly less than anything my maids do at home. All she had to do was make sure I was up by 10 a.m. every morning and fetch me my breakfast bagel with lox (I was used to caviar, but I’ve found the Pines caviar to be quite bland). Afterwards, she should have gone to class with me, or if I was feeling particularly weak that day, she should have gone without me to take my notes. Believe it or not, she has never done that for me. The audacity!

She refrained from telling me that the final was going to be this week! Nevertheless, I will give her the benefit of the doubt, since she stated she was not privy to my classes’ final schedule. What kind of class surprises their students with a final on Week 10 when there is a dedicated finals week? Surely, this all could have been remediated if Agatha had done her job correctly.


Counterpoint: I’m Not Responsible for My Roommate

By Agatha Walker
Computer Science Major, Second Year

I have absolutely no clue where Kimberly got the idea that I am responsible for her. I’m not her mom, but I think her mom would just make the maids do it. I understand that she’s a first year, but this is just too much. She expected me to do everything from cleaning her side of the room to doing her laundry. Since I wouldn’t do that, she’d just buy new clothes whenever her clothes got too dirty to wear, and she paid some other poor college student to clean her room. To be honest, I would have done it if she offered to pay me, but nope, according to her it’s part of the roommate’s job.

Before things got weird with Kimberly, I thought it would be a nice gesture to show her around during the first few days of classes, so she could learn the campus and get used to college life. I was being a good returning student teaching the naive freshman. That was a terrible mistake. She nagged me all quarter. She expected — still expects — me to remember her schedule and go to class with her so I can take her notes. I’m not even in any of her classes, or even remotely the same major. She even filed a request for a note taker in the Office for Student Disabilities. Apparently, she was told that they only give disability services to people with disabilities, regardless of who your father is.

Now she is blaming me for her mistake of missing her first of two finals. Last night, she threatened to sue me for withholding information from her. You’ve got to be kidding me. Though, I’ll probably ditch my final to show her where Ledden Auditorium is because I think her family has the
money to win the case against me if she does.

Design Editor at The MQ

Sophia is a Design Editor at The MQ and yes she goes by her middle name. She has been a part of The MQ since the 2016-17 school year and an editor since 2017. She is a psychology major at UCSD and in her free time she plays french horn in an orchestra and wind ensemble.

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