Professors, Politics, and a Little Bit of Panic: My Course Life at Sciences Po

Bright-eyed, dragging my overstuffed suitcase through the Côte d’Azur heat, fuelled by the wild hope of mastering French, Arabic, and academic referencing. Spoiler: I am not quite there yet.

Somewhere between my sleepy 8:00 am lectures and passionate classroom debates, I discovered just how much one year can stretch you, shape you, and surprise you. With the whiffs of the salty Mediterranean sea enveloping me and the clatter of my keyboard under my fingers, I rediscovered myself as a student.

Let’s start with the basics: the courses. Sciences Po, known for its intellectually intense curriculum, truly does deliver. But the true challenge lies beyond the academics; it’s emotional, cultural, and sometimes even existential (that tends to occur around exam week).

Take Law and Political Institutions for example. Sounds rather dry, right? Well, not quite. Our professors wove the legal systems into what felt almost like a timepiece drama; power plays, institutional tensions, the occasional revolutionary plot twist. We immersed ourselves in legal frameworks, constitutional debates, and the ever-daunting question: "What even is a state?” Between Rousseau and Montesquieu, the world of political institutions formed in front of me; far from abstract, but as living structures shaping our very own lives. This class, alongside International Law in the second semester, equipped me with the language to understand power, but most importantly, the courage to question it.

History of the 19th Century was its own drama, from class struggle (both mine and society’s) to empire-building. As one of the rare few in my batch who never took history in school, I felt like the ground was pulled from under me as I walked out of my first four-hour history lecture. My notes had a thousand red squiggles, most of which I couldn’t figure out myself, and my brain desperately tried to wring buckets of knowledge to keep up. Nevertheless, as overwhelming as it was, the fascination was what kept me going back for more, as the classes always ended with a flair of intellectual suspense. The depth and specificity of the knowledge often extended far beyond what I could have imagined. But that’s what made it exciting; it became a space where I could explore my own historical artifacts in relation to the topics we studied.

Around midterms, while rolling around my studio and cracking open what could have easily been my seventeenth can of energy drink that week, I realized I wanted to learn history from the perspective of the communities I grew up in, and so I did. I found myself reflecting on the impacts of Orientalism and industrialization in Kurdistan, analyzing Mem u Zin, and the influence of Romanticism in South India. My professors welcomed my personal research and studies, giving me a space to lead with curiosity and engage in discussions extending beyond what our classroom discussed. History taught me more than just how everything came to be, but how the world truly is my oyster, and I am welcome to explore and offer more than what is given to me.

Now, my beloved languages: French and Arabic. The two classes that had me sitting on the edge of my seat, desperately trying to roll my Rs more times than I had been locked out of my studio that year. Progressing through French A1 to B1, rethinking every sentence structure I’d ever known and enjoying our multicultural debates in broken sentences and sly peeks at Google Translate under our desks. Arabic A1, on the other hand, was joyous, from the rhythm of the letters to the surprisingly soothing structure of grammar. Whilst I still do mix up my “ba” and “ta” somehow, the little discussions on slang and dialects we had have made me proud of my "shaku maku!" 

Menton truly is a wonderful place for those with a language bug like myself. With our wide array of language courses offered, we also sit in a melting pot of cultures; with Italy a mere 10-minute train away and the diverse communities that live within cities like Nice. Every week, I got a little closer to speaking with the Mediterranean, not just living in it.

In the second semester, we are invited to take a 3-credit Artistic Workshop, with classes ranging from oriental dance to comics. I had the pleasure of attending my workshop Embodied Knowledges with Tanin Torabi. The workshop explored contemporary dance and performance, as well as different methods of presenting art itself. Our class time would fly by as we debated art, swayed to music, spoke, yelled, and whispered. It reminded me that artistic resistance is often quiet, and that sometimes our body expresses what our mind cannot. Most importantly, in a year filled with caffeine, chaos, and pushing my body and mind to the brink with sleepless study nights, it taught me to reconnect with myself physically and mentally. It allowed my body to move, explore, and feel, giving it time to process and breathe. Something that I hope to continue building into my routine moving forward.

So, yes, the classes were intense, strange, beautiful, and sometimes brutal. But they were never boring. Each course was like entering a different realm: one day I was decoding legal texts, the next I was debating Gramsci or analyzing Palestinian identity politics; some days I just twirled with castanets in my hand and giggled over our clumsy belly dancing with my future roommate. But through it all, I grew.

Most importantly, I learned that Sciences Po does not want perfection. It wants perspective. It celebrates questions, uncertainties, and even the occasional (or frequent) academic meltdown. And that made all the difference.

Saloni Suri

Dual Degree student at Sciences Po Paris (Menton Campus) and the University of Hong Kong, majoring in Political Humanities and Social Policy and Social Development