Reader question: Please explain “being in a candy store for four years” in the following passage (School within a school: MIT Concourse, MIT.edu, December 10, 2017.): The single best thing about college for MIT Professor of History Anne McCants was “exploring ideas ravenously.” It was like being in a candy store for four years," she says. Now, as newly appointed director of Concourse, a learning community for MIT freshmen, McCants says her goal is to give today's students the same heady experience of intellectual adventure and discovery... My comments: If only all students thought that way. Well, “four years” refer to the length of most college studies for an undergraduate. “Like being in a candy store” is “like being a child in a candy store”. Professor McCants thinks Concourse provides such a variety of exciting courses that all students will “feel like children in a candy store for four years”, never getting tired of the studies. This is the phrase in full: Feel like a child in a candy store. You know what children feel like in a candy store, or shop, don’t you? Yes, they’re open-eyed, excited and practically cannot help themselves but help themselves with all the lovely packaged candies on display. It’s a feeling that you have everything you want in the world all to yourself. Or something like that. |