The Last Good Girl Read Online Free PDF Page A

summer and are ready to jump back into exploring, learning, and growing.
    This e-mail is to give you your first assignment, which begins before we even meet the first time, because now is such an interesting time for you, and it should be captured.
    Please record at least one video per week, in which you describe your experience as a college student—your reaction to your roommates, teachers, the college itself. This is a video log of your time here, also known as a vlog. This assignment will continue throughout the year. It is my hope that you will not only grow comfortable talking on camera, but that this will be a project which will allow you to look back and track how much you’ve changed and grown, and to reflect on the forces that shape us.
    Please start this week. Describe how you feel as you arrive at school and settle in. This is the only week where I’ll ask for specific content, which is the following: (1) Describe yourself in three words. (2) Tell me your greatest strength and your greatest weakness. (You should get used to these questions, by the way, as you’ll be asked them in job interviews for the rest of your life!)
    In future sessions, your vlog can be as simple or elaborate as you’d like. Some students find this to be quite cathartic. The only minimum is that you record yourself for at least five minutes every month.
    Get creative. Sing, if the spirit moves you! Dance! Dress up as your teachers and impersonate them. Film three minutes of yourself being President Shapiro. Eat your least favorite food from the cafeteria on camera. Time-lapse how fast a Domino’s pizza is devoured by you and your friends. Or just talk, share what you’re feeling and thinking. Viewers respond to authenticity. This is your experience.
    Create your own channel on BlueTube, with the settings on “private” so no one else can view them. Upload all your videos for storage, but do not publish them to the public. Do not view them yourself until the end of the year. You may be amazed to look back and see the changes in yourself. In May, you will review your videos and choose your top five, which most encapsulate your student experience. Submit those to me.
    Our first class meets on September 3, 2014, in Vamvas Auditorium. Please arrive at two P.M. in loose and comfortable clothes, and with a willingness to open your hearts and minds to other students.

VLOG
RECORDED 9.1.14
    Okay.
    Um.
    Hi.
    I’m Emily Shapiro. Nice to meet you.
    This is . . . weird, talking to my phone. I hope somebody doesn’t walk in and think I’m a freak. I guess I could say I’m FaceTiming. Or just explain that this is an assignment. It’s just, everyone here is so academic. The place is full of National Merit Scholars and assorted whiz kids. Everyone’s elective is, like, macroeconomics. I don’t want to be the one intellectual lightweight. Sorry, I don’t mean to offend you, Professor Robinson.
    Jeez. That was stupid. I should start over or edit that out. Or . . . not? Maybe that’s the point. Maybe a vlog is extra honest ’cause there’s no going back and erasing. You can see me realizing I’m an idiot in real time.
    So, okay, it’s September 1, 2014, and this is my first day as a freshman. The leaves are gold, the sky is blue, and I have to admit, I’m pretty psyched. I’ve lived on this campus my whole life—but I’ve never really been in it. It feels kind of surreal that this is finally my time.
    Okay, so you know my little secret: my dad is the president of the university. I don’t tell most people, but you recognized me at the meet and greet. A lot of professors don’t; the campus is big enough that I can get lost in the crowd. So, anyway, you know why I won’t be doing any imitations of President Shapiro for class, ha ha. Or maybe I will! I’ll be the best at it.
    So, you might ask: Why Tower U? Why not UCLA or