Hello Northwestern, how are you feeling?

A little cold, perhaps? Don’t worry, I have the solution to NU’s biggest problem.

If there’s anything I’ve learned in my two and a half years at NU, it’s that Winter Quarter sucks. Nobody likes to wake up at 8:30 a.m. and walk through frigid temperatures and biting wind to go to an off-campus party, much less Intro to Psych.

“So what?” you say. It’s winter. It’s cold. It’s just one of those things that you have to learn to deal with, you say.

Not so. As you read this, I am in Miami interning for credit, and I have to jack up the air conditioning in my car on the way to work every day. It was 91 degrees a few days ago. And whereas in Evanston I would cover my skin before I went outside in January to fend off frostbite, I now to do the same thing to repel the sun’s evil rays.

Yes, Miami is a beautiful place. As a matter of fact, the only thing I can think to compare it to is Evanston – in the summer, that is. As difficult as it may be to believe, this chilly, gray prison camp you now live in turns into a vibrant, colorful hamlet between the months of June and September.

Which is why NU administrators should swap Winter and Summer Quarters, giving students an April to November school year and eliminating the cold sore that resides on NU’s metaphorical tongue.

Summer Quarter would be like a three-month-long Dillo Day. Think about it: Instead of wearing two pairs of socks underneath your boots to keep your toes from turning black, you’d be walking to class in flip-flops. Instead of skipping classes because you’re afraid to leave the comfort of your dorm room, you’d be skipping classes to toss a Frisbee on North Beach. And if you were in a fraternity, your drunken friends would be passing out in soft patches of grass instead of snow banks.

As far as our usual summer activities, which among them couldn’t be done better during our new, improved Winter Break? If we start Spring Break at the same time we do now, we’d be able to finish Fall Quarter right before Thanksgiving. So we’d be able to chill out for a month between Thanksgiving and Christmas, and then at the beginning of January go after those internships we so covet. And with all the Harvard brats busy trying to pull all the ivy out of their pants, the competition in the job market would be much friendlier to us hard-working Wildcats.

We would have to make a few sacrifices to facilitate the change. For instance, we’d have to disband the men’s basketball team. Do you care? Neither do I. And seeing as how our three best players transfer at the end of every season, the team obviously doesn’t, either.

So how can we make this a reality? Well, the way I see it, we have three avenues to choose from:

_Ѣ Besiege the Bienster. If we flood University President Hank Bienen’s inbox with e-mails begging him to make the change, he’ll have no choice but to do so, right? I mean, students are his top priority, right? Right?

_Ѣ Okay, so that might not work. But this will: Drop all your classes, right now. Go home, take a few months off. Then enroll in summer courses. Take four of them. They’re a little harder (10-week workloads are condensed to six-week schedules), but no one said this was going to be easy.

_Ѣ Not up for a little extra homework? Then there’s only one thing left to do: Transfer.

University of Miami, here we come.