The Changing Pace of the Testing Center

As I headed home, the news found me. The line to the Testing Center snaked out of the doors, all the way to the Brimhall building. Perfect, I thought, what a great opportunity to show the angst of students dealing with the consequences of the Testing Center's newly decreased capacity. The Universe broke the disheartening news recently that fire code officials found the Testing Center to be far over safe capacity, so about a third of the seats have been taken out. Predictably, the waiting lines have gotten worse recently.

I stood in line freezing like everyone else for a while, talking about the new changes, and speculating about how bad this year's lines for finals were going to be. The mood was pretty grim.

But then, the sound of cheery voices! Someone was handing out encouragement in the form of Tootsie Rolls. A family home evening group had decided to spread some cheer. Some enterprising hot chocolate salesmen had shown up before, but had had decidedly less success. They needed up giving most of their inventory. I took some standard portraits, but liked their shiftier look here, captured as they explained themselves.

At the other end of the Testing Center, I found yet another FHE group. This time, they formed a human tunnel and handed out Krispy Kreme donuts to the test takers as they left the building. They ended up getting hushed by testing center staff as the cheers were starting to disturb the test takers upstairs. Or so they said.

Oh well. The FHE group was happy, and some random test takers were happy, even if they had to miss FHE and had to stand out in the cold in a ridiculous early November Testing Center line that never should have been. 

In these pictures, I tried my best to capture little slices of life, mostly taking pictures when no one expected them. The FHE group asked me to take their group photo, and it seemed right to show a quasi-family unit just like it was with a  quasi-akward family photo. The shots of the line mostly used strong lines to suggest something of the seriousness of the situation the scope of the problem. The shots of the doughnut-givers were shot much closer in, with the emphasis placed on the faces of the givers and receivers. Lines and order were less important here - it was all about the people in the compositions and their interactions with one another. It was like an impromptu celebration. The University sure didn't sanction it, in any case. And maybe it was better that they didn't.