TU Cribs: These office hours come with homemade cookies
Have fears of the unknown ever kept you from attending office hours? Are you nosy about the interests of your professors, but you can’t quite find a proper reason to sign up for a meeting with them? Do you like interior design and enjoy falling into “MTV Cribs” YouTube rabbit holes? If so, our new feature series of office tours, TU Cribs (MTV, please don’t sue us) is for you.
Every week, we will be interviewing professors known for their office hours, whether for their cozy ambiance or their iconic office decor, and getting to know them and their spaces a little better. To pilot this idea, I couldn’t think of a better person to interview than Benjamin Eldon Stevens, a visiting classics professor perhaps known best for his engaging, often theatrical teaching style and his willingness to converse with students about anything from ancient languages to science fiction.
Stevens’ office is located on the second floor of the newly renovated Classical studies department in the Ewing Halsell Center. He moved in only a few weeks before the semester began, and while some parts of the office are still works in progress, the space is already full of life and interest. It is modest and cozy, the narrowness of the space accentuated by two large, thin windows that let in rectangles of light. Stevens’ bookshelves line the office’s left side, bearing all sorts of books, board games and little treasures. Upon entering his space, we are greeted with an offer of hot tea and the most delicious homemade chai tea cookies I have ever tasted. We then settled in for a chat about Stevens’ office hours and the welcoming, memory-filled place that he does his work in.
I am a senior photographer from Houston, Texas majoring in Biology on the pre-PA track. I love sports photography and just being able to capture a moment...
