“I didn’t do anything over the break, which is why I’m drowned in work at the moment,” said Wharton freshman Shiv Kapoor in a familiar refrain, repeated by students all over campus.
Kapoor, a native of New Delhi, India spent Thanksgiving break visiting friends from home in Chicago.
With the year coming to a close and finals approaching, he now has to focus on studying to round out the semester.
“I’m just going with the flow,” he said, “taking everything one step at a time.”
He has a quiz on Wednesday, a presentation for Management 100 on Thursday and his freshman writing seminar portfolio due next week, on top of regularly scheduled exams.
“It’s tough to do,” he admitted, “but since we’re going to have time off [for reading days] … that helps a lot.”
Penn’s exam system is different from what he had in his native country, where reading days don’t exist. However, students generally cut school between exams “unless they have doubts” about their knowledge of the material, he explained.
“It’s pretty much acceptable as long as you meet the minimum attendance quota,” he said.
In comparison to his workload at home, Kapoor said testing is much more evenly spread at Penn, despite sometimes having multiple assessments in one day.
He didn’t have regular tests back in India and had to exhibit all his knowledge at once, he explained.
“You have to be a lot more consistent here,” he said. “Over there, you could afford to slack off for like, a week.”
Next semester, Kapoor is taking classes for both his Wharton course load and for College sector requirements, as he hopes to receive a dual degree in both schools.
“I’m just trying to balance both,” he said. “Hopefully, my GPA is good enough to be admitted to the College.”
In terms of classes, Kapoor said he has tried to pick courses that, should he not be admitted to the College, will still count toward his Wharton degree.
“I’ve tried to be very careful with what I’ve picked, so I don’t waste time,” he said.
This past semester, Kapoor has kept himself busy with the performance of “1-800-DIAL-INDIA,” a play produced by the on-campus theater group PenNaatak. Naatak is Hindi for “dramatics.”
He said he hopes to participate in another play next year, though not necessarily next semester, as he wants to try something different.
“I would definitely like to do another play with [PenNaatak],” he said, “but I would also like to do one outside of that … maybe some more serious theater.”
PenNaatak is more commercially appealing and comedy-based, he explained.
“I’ll try a different genre of play for sure,” he continued. “It’s important to exercise every part of your acting muscles.”
A major difference between Penn theater and high school theater is the lack of faculty or adult moderators, he said.
He admitted that he prefers to have productions entirely student-run, as “1-800-DIAL-INDIA” was.
“You have a lot more autonomy to do what you want,” he said. “You feel a lot more responsible for the final product, and you become more attached to it.”
“And rehearsals are way more fun,” he added.
Kapoor has also been occupied by his Management 100 project, an event held in conjunction with Philadelphia’s Center for Literacy to raise awareness about low literacy levels.
“There are no ulterior motives,” he explained, when discussing his enjoyment of the project. “It’s something you do for society.”
Kapoor is already looking beyond finals and even beyond classes next year. As a sophomore, he plans to live in the high rises with both new friends from Penn and others he knew in India.
“Since we’ve all made good friends, I’d like to stay with them,” he said. “And the high rises are convenient — it’s almost like an apartment.”
In the short-term, Kapoor is looking forward to winter break and finally going back to India to see his relatives, particularly his parents and his little brother.
Though he saw his parents for a few days this semester when they were on a business trip to Canada, he has not seen his brother since last August.
“We definitely talk a lot,” he said. “But it’ll be nice to go back home and lounge around.”
He said he is excited to take a break from worrying about laundry or cleaning his room, “and catching up on sleep, of course.”
“I look forward to coming back completely rejuvenated for the next semester,” he said. “But I’m kind of sad this semester is over — I really had a lot of fun.”
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