Bright and Shiny: My Back to School Advice for Incoming Freshmen

With only a couple of weeks to go until the Fall term starts, I'm starting to get all of the back to school messages from my university. Come to Orientation! Pick up your U-pass! Come to Parents' Orientation! Wait. What? Ugh, thank god they didn't have that when I first started in 2002.

Soon to be filled with students doing
anything but homework.

But in all seriousness, if you are a 17 or 18 year old who's getting ready to start your first year of university, congratulations. Going to university can be a rich and rewarding experience if it's the right place for you. And I guess it can be a good life lesson even if it's not the right place for you. Regardless of which situation applies to you, I've got some tidbits of advice that I hope can help you avoid becoming a curmudgeon like me. Do as I say, kids; don't do as I did.

1. Go to Orientation

This is something I definitely did not do when I started and it probably would have helped me out a lot as a shy 17 year old. Not only will you meet a couple of people who are as clueless as you, you'll at least know where the hell you're going on your first day. You do not want to be the person who shows up late for Spanish huffing and puffing because you've been half-way across campus and back trying to find the classroom (that was totally me). I also managed to meet one of my very good girlfriends while bonding over the suckiness of the UofA's transfer student orientation. Meeting her was totally worth the corny chanting and over-eager campus guides.

2. Make New Friends

If you're going to school away from home, you are pretty much forced to do this, especially if you are living on campus. If you're attending a local school, this gets much harder. It's even worse if you're living at home. The cliches about these being the best years of your life and university as the place for meeting lifelong friends exist because for the most part, they're true.

As much as university is a place to gain new knowledge, it's also a place to gain new friends and contacts. It might not be something you're thinking about right now, but in 10 years, you're probably going to be working with some of these people. Hell, you might be working FOR these people. In the end, who you know really is as important as what you know. 

Resist the temptation to hang out with your friends from high school all the time and meet some new people. Talk to the people in your classes, join  a study group, sign up for intramurals - anything that gets you outside of your regular clique. (Admit it, you totally have one.)

3. Get Out Of Your Bubble

This guy will sit here all year.
And then huff at you when you take that
spot before he gets there.

This kind of goes with #2 but, seriously, if you came to university to hand out with your high school friends or people from the same ethnic/socioeconomic background as yourself, don't bother going at all.

Speaking from my experience, university is increasingly becoming an upper-middle-class mecca which is seriously compromising one of the major benefits of attendance. Meeting people who are different than you, with different ideas and from different backgrounds, is an amazingly rewarding and enriching experience. Your classes are going to be full of material thought up by a bunch of old white men and taught through the lens of the white middle-class experience. Chances are, there are people in your classes that see things differently. Seek them out. Ask questions. For the love of god don't just sit there like a silent blob.

Join a club to learn about something new. Attend events hosted by the cultural clubs on campus. Get your ass kicked in a debate with someone who doesn't agree with you about anything.

4. Avoid Working (If you can)

This one is tricky. I worked for the entirety of my first undergrad degree and it severely limited my ability to enjoy a full university experience. That said, it was the only way I could pay for it. 

If you can afford it, don't work. Or at least work less. Having spending money for extra beer is great, but having time to actually be a student is better. This is probably the only time in your life where you can get away with dressing like a hobo, so skip the shopping and cut back those serving hours so you have time to go to that research presentation or that drama club performance.

5. Be Good To Your Brain & Your Body

Let's be honest, getting drunk when you're young is damn fun. Going dancing is fun. Indulging in cheap pitchers at the campus bar when you're supposed to be in your finance seminar is fun. Staying up til 5am playing beer pong is fun. Until you get sick for 2 months because your immune system can't handle it anymore. Or you fail a midterm because you showed up hammered (true story, kids).

Love your brain like Lisa Simpson. Dial back the binge drinking every once in a while. Eat your veggies. Man cannot live on ramen and KD alone. EXERCISE. The freshman 15 is not a myth (even if it didn't happen to me until the second time around)! And if you're feeling completely overwhelmed, don't be afraid to ask for help. You're not alone.

6. Don't be Afraid to Quit

There are as many paths to success as there are successful people. In a world where you now need a post-secondary certificate to answer phones or a degree and 5 years experience to be a glorified party planner for your alma mater, it might seem like you have no choice but to be in school. That is a lie. 

If you are hating your experience, it's okay to quit and go do something else. Go work full-time for a bit. Go on a working holiday and travel. Go work on a crazy project with your friends. Just do something. Sitting on your parents' couch watching cat videos on YouTube isn't going to cut it. There are lots of other ways to learn things and be successful.

Maybe you'll go back to school when you're older and more focused. Maybe your travels will lead you in a completely different direction. Maybe you decide you want to make a gazillion dollars a year as a welder. Whatever it is, it's okay. You do you. Your parents and all their expectations will deal with it.

Go forth and learn, Freshies! The beginning of fall term is the best! Walk around like you're in a 90's college movie staring Julia Stiles! Wear plaid and cable knit sweaters! And then try to hold onto that feeling for the rest of the term. Good luck!

Extra-Curricular: The Need for Idle Time

I've always worried about my highly creative and artistic sister. When she graduated from university with a music degree and didn't immediately seek out a full-time job, I thought she was crazy. Instead, she took a couple of part-time gigs and continued to do what she's always done - create.

I never understood it. I mean, how could she not be DOING things? How could she not be worried about getting ahead and contributing to her RRSP as soon as possible?

Since the age of 15, I have always been busy. That summer, I got my first job and worked as many hours as I could. Any free time was devoured by my best friend and we spent as much time as possible consuming - food, music, stuff. Since the age of 15, I've spent very little time creating. After all, I was going to be a stock broker or an international diplomat. I didn't have a craft that needed perfecting or projects that needed cultivating.

Due to some strange circumstances on my career path, I've spent the large part of the last two summers unemployed. In both of those scenarios, the bulk of my time was devoted to finding a job because that's what my path at the time was all about. I had to find the next opportunity. Whatever time wasn't devoted to resume refining and cover letter writing was occupied with trying to stay as busy as possible to avoid becoming horribly depressed at my self-perceived uselessness. 

Over the past year and as I gradually come into my own as an artist, I'm starting to see what my sister has always understood. Creativity requires time and space. Honing a craft takes practice. It's difficult to do these things when you're spending your best hours of the day working for someone else instead of yourself.

This summer, I chickened out. Instead of working for me like I had planned, I worked for someone else. Now, as the summer draws to a close, I'm reminded of something my wise sis' told me: "Money is good. But now you're going to have to buy yourself some time."

I wish I had heeded her warning earlier. Even though I've learned the value of creative time that others might see as wasted, I'm still not entirely comfortable or confident enough to carve some of it out for myself. Part of what I value so much about being back in school is that I've basically bought myself some time to explore my talents and creative side. No one can tell me I'm wasting my time because at the end of the road I'll have another fancy piece of paper to show for it. But I'm willing to admit now that my scholarly adventure is a really good disguise for not working while exercising long dormant parts of my brain.

 Hopefully I will keep this lesson in mind as the school year approaches. There are already too many events to attend, too many side projects to contribute to, too many groups to be a part of - all ready to fill my time and distract me. This is a serious challenge for a person who is almost compulsive about being busy. So my new back to school affirmation will read like this: It's perfectly legitimate to spend all day on the couch reading; an afternoon writing in your journal is an acceptable use of time; the stories that pop into your head are no good if you don't give yourself the time to actually write them down.