The average Bucknellian doesn’t talk to their parents on a daily basis, which is no surprise. Nothing beats the freedom of living a carefree life without constantly needing to give updates on grades, girls and social life to one’s parents.
However, the longer students go without talking to their parents, the more anxious their parents become. Thus, to keep Bucknellian parents off their heels, I thought I would give them what they want: a description of the day in the life of an average Bucknell student. For the description, we shall follow the day of Freddie Martin ’26.
After barely getting four hours of sleep, Freddie rolls out of bed and stumbles into his first class of the day 15 minutes late. In those 15 minutes, Freddie missed out on a lot! Students turned in their homework, the professor took attendance and a test was announced for the next class. By the time Freddie found his seat, the lecture was already underway, and his grade had already plummeted two letter grades without him even knowing.
Now, it’s lunchtime. Though Freddie’s parents were paying top-dollar for unlimited swipes at the caf, Freddie decided to splurge on lunch instead by dropping $30 at Bull Run with some of his friends. Little did his parents know, this was his 15th time at Bull Run this semester, and his unlimited swipes were going to waste.
After enjoying his expensive meal, Freddie decides to finally get to work. After all, he has an eight-page paper due tonight. After taking one look at the prompt, though, Freddie decides to think smarter, not harder. Thus, he copies the prompt into ChatGPT, pastes the output into his paper and submits it onto Moodle. Little did he know that his professor uses Turnitin to scan for plagiarism, and he was about to fail another important assignment.
Exhausted from a day filled with hard work, Freddie finally decides to kick back, relax and enjoy his Thursday night. And what better way to have a great time than putting a $50 parlay on the Bears-Commanders football game? After all, nothing could possibly go wrong!
Three hours later, Freddie is $50 poorer and solemnly turns off the TV after watching his favorite team get embarrassed on Thursday Night Football. He could also feel his lunch coming up, as his Bull Run burger from earlier was severely undercooked. Additionally, he received an email from his professor about a potential suspension after finding out about the ChatGPT scandal.
Though things are going terribly wrong for Freddie, he still manages to salvage a sly grin. “My parents will never find out about any of this,” he chuckles to himself.
Freddy is in for a rude awakening in the morning when his mom sees the credit card bill.