The Journey of a Thousand Miles Begins with a Single Test
About a week ago, I took the Test of Critical Reading and Writing Skills, a prerequisite for the Proseminar course that serves as one of three admission courses for humanities and social science programs at the Harvard Extension School. The test is relatively simple, and for me, it consisted of an excerpt of a text with five critical reading questions and an essay prompt based on the text. I was given one hour to complete the test. Honestly, the hardest part wasn't even the test itself; it was the pressure to perform. Looking back, that seems kind of silly. This is not an admission exam. This test does not determine whether I can or cannot enroll in courses from the Harvard Extension School. What it does determine is whether I will need to take an additional expository writing course before taking the Proseminar course. While this wouldn't be the end of the world, considering that the expository writing course would also count as an elective toward my degree and fulfill an adm...