MORE ABOUT SYLVIE
Graduation Date: December 2007
Hometown: Highland Park, Illinois
High School: New Trier High School
Awards & Achievements:
- Dean's List
- Top 15 percent of class
Current Employment:
Streamline Wireless — Cingular/AT&T
Sylvie Nemetz
Area of Study:English
I chose my major because... I enjoy reading and writing and have always done well in previous English classes. I also believe that being able to write properly is essential when getting a job in any profession. I enjoy comparative literature and analytical analyses of books, articles, or any type of reading.
My favorite thing to do on campus is… sit in The Pit and do homework or just talk with friends. When it is nice out, I enjoy sitting outside in the quad and doing my work there because I find it to be a really beautiful campus. I used to go to Lincoln Park Day Camp (before it was Fred’s Camp) and our location was actually the DePaul campus in Lincoln Park. Every time I sit on the grass in the quad or go to the gym, I remember my time as a little camper. That always makes me smile.
I decided to attend DePaul because… I wanted to be near my house and my family in Highland Park, and I grew up in Lincoln Park and I love the area. I also knew that DePaul was a smaller campus and that the size of the classes would allow me to learn more effectively.
The learning environment here at DePaul is… wonderful because the professor’s are very friendly and they seem like they really want to be teaching. I also find the curriculum far more interesting than I did at my other schools. The class size is also manageable, and as students we are able to speak and contribute to class discussions more often.
The class I most enjoyed here was… English 377, which is a topics course that fulfills the liberal arts requirement of experiential learning. The class was writing and social engagement, and part of the course was tutoring students in ESL. The teacher, Christine Tardy, is also my favorite professor.
When I have free time, I like to… I don’t usually have free time but when I do, I enjoy reading a good book. I also like to go home a lot and be with my family for a quick dinner or just to hang out. I also have my few TV shows that I watch every week.
My favorite thing to do off campus is … I like to bike around the Lincoln Park area and look at the beautiful houses that have been put up recently and all the new developments. Because I grew up in this area, it is shocking to drive on my old street and see all the new houses.
One thing I didn’t know about DePaul before coming was... I didn’t know that there were two campuses. I didn’t know that it was possible to take classes at both campuses or even live in the downtown campus.
Here, the diversity of students, faculty and staff… Those characteristics of DePaul only make the school that much better because they allow for students to experience many new things, meet different types of people and open their mind to new cultures.
The greatest thing about going to school in Chicago is… everything. The food, the music scene, the shopping, the atmosphere — they’re all amazing. No matter who you are or what kind of path you’re on in life, there’s something that you’ll enjoy or some place that’ll feel like home to you.
At DePaul, service learning is… very important, as I learned in my ENG 377 class. DePaul has even created its own department to help students that are participating or interested in service learning, The Steans Center.
The one DePaul experience I will always remember will be… Today is Yom Ha’shoah and being a Jew at a Catholic University, I was not expecting anything to be done. As I was walking to the library this morning, I noticed many different colored flags all around the quad. I read a sign that told me that today was Holocaust Remembrance Day and that each colored flag stood for different groups of people and that one flag stood for 5,000 lives lost during the Holocaust. The blue flags were for Jews and it make me proud to know that DePaul is very accepting and that they acknowledged a very important day in the lives of, probably, many Jews on this campus.
The best thing about DePaul is… the faculty and staff. I think the professors are some of the smartest and greatest people I have ever known and I am honored to have them as my teachers. They make class interesting, practical, community oriented and — most of all — useful for their students’ futures.
What I remember most about my first quarter at DePaul is… I took a history course that I was positive I would fail, because I don’t enjoy history and I have never been particularly good at it. I actually ended up loving the professor and the subject matter that was taught and I ended up with a B in the class, which is my highest grade ever in a history class. Since that class, I have had an open mind about every class I enroll in.
My greatest success as a student here has been… After three quarters at DePaul, I can now say that my greatest success as a student here is that I enjoy school and I feel challenged in my classes. I am very confident that I made the right choice to come to DePaul.
After graduation, I plan to… I hope that after I graduate I will get to travel around Europe and possibly live in Israel for some time. I want to at least get out of the country and see the world. I think it will enable me to make the decision of what profession I would like to go into in the future.
The one thing I’d like to say to students considering DePaul is… Coming from New Trier High School, DePaul is not necessarily considered one of the more challenging schools. I just want students to know how incorrect that idea is. If I did not grow up in the Lincoln Park area, I would be fascinated at the beauty of our campus and the quality of our curriculum. I have known what a great school DePaul is all of my life because I am from around here, but to students who are not, I just want to make sure that we spread the word that DePaul is a prestigious university and every student should be honored to go here.
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