Here and I have heard in most other places, the university makes quite an effort at the beginning of the first term to make students comfortable with being here and to connect them as quickly as possible with others so that it becomes easy to develop a range of new acquaintances and new friends and unify under some banner or other. I chose to do sports which served the same purpose.
For many people, the friendships made in these first few days and weeks form the basis for their social life for the entire time they are at the university. Sports team, subject group, residence floor, society or club, fraternity or sorority, it really doesn't matter. All serve the essential purpose of kickstarting your social life and making you comfortable in this new stage of your life.
The first year of school, you are often missing home and your friends; I even had thoughts of transferring in those first few weeks. Joining a team made me feel better. I also participated in other things that were specifically designed to bring us first years together. But later I opted to branch out from what I now perceived as a kind of cage. I deliberately moved to a different floor, got involved in different activities and went to different parties.
One advantage of branching out is that everywhere you go on campus, you meet people who you know. But the most important thing for me has been that even though I feel I have a lot of connections on campus and many different friends that I hang out with, I have met a fairly small number of people with whom I have been able to make a much deeper and more complete connection. These are friends who are truly congruent with me, not that we agree on all topics.
The people who were on my team and on my original floor still seem to cling together. Next year they will share a house together, they still go on trips together, they party together. Together together together. But they are not branching out.
So strongly did I feel about this that I started a group. The purpose is to look at the mixes on campus, the cliques that have formed; we try to push people beyond their social boundaries. Because when you get down to it, we all share pretty much common interests by just coming to this school in the first place.
A friend of mine found the same thing. He played basketball in his freshman year and found that his entire life revolved around his basketball and the people he played basketball with. He joined the team to get to know people and to bond with them and it did serve that purpose. But it also limited the kinds of people he spent time with and what he did. He went so far as to quit basketball after his freshman year so that he could branch out to get away from that team and that limiting mindset.
The question you have to ask is: are you hanging out with these people because circumstances have placed you together or because they are truly the types of people who you would really want to become friends with.
Wednesday, June 24, 2009
How to Score a Scholarship
Most people think scholarships are reserved for the super smart individuals in high school. The truth is that there are more scholarships out there than you think and they are not ridiculously hard to obtain if your marks are good. The trick is that you have to go searching for them. You'd be amazed at how many people just don't seem to bother doing it. Naive or lazy? Who knows? But you can be the beneficiary.
In my graduating year of high school, I checked out many resources. I inquired about scholarships at my school and did some online searching for various university scholarships, bursaries, grants, government assistance, company and even foundation scholarships. Great marks are not the only criterion; there are sports and volunteering scholarships, scholarships for minorities and even those given out by community clubs.
Filling out forms for government tuition assistance is a must. Many universities have a separate bursary application you can fill out to receive extra funding; however, they do take into consideration your government funding to determine your level of financial need.
I found a lot of scholarships through my high school. This is a great place to start because many universities will notify the high schools of the awards and scholarships available ahead of time. Talk to your guidance counsellors. They can point you in the right direction and even nominate you for special scholarships.
Start early, look everywhere and talk to everyone. Scholarship deadlines are spread out throughout the year and application deadlines can be as early as October or as late as April.
Make a timeline of everything you’ve done up to date. What clubs/sports are you in? Do you volunteer or have a job? Have you won any awards or held any leadership positions? All these factors are taken into account. Another important piece of advice is to make sure you have all necessary documents ready beforehand. Many scholarships will require reference letters, transcripts or written essays. Be prepared to know what is expected of you.
Don't rule out sports scholarships. Some Universities aren't supposed to have scholarships for a particular sport because the team isn't in the right Division, but in fact they do. Scouts recommend you and, surprise, you're offered an academic scholarship. The trick is that when the disguise their intent in this way, it only really binds the student to try out for the team, not necessarily to play all season. I'm sure you get the drift.
There are also scholarships for out-of-country students. Some are sports scholarships, others are – well in this University they're called “Diversity Scholarships”, because the school wants to increase the diversity of the student body. That's an opportunity for someone with an unusual background.
You may think applying for too many scholarships or bursaries will be impossibly time consuming. But for many, the essay questions are fairly similar. It might take you 3 hours to apply for the first one, but with the wonders of copying and pasting, it’ll take you only 1 hour to fill out subsequent applications.
Please don’t get discouraged if you aren’t awarded anything or as much as you would have hoped for. Keep in mind that there are others who are also applying. Don’t give up. You can do it. Just believe in yourself.
In my graduating year of high school, I checked out many resources. I inquired about scholarships at my school and did some online searching for various university scholarships, bursaries, grants, government assistance, company and even foundation scholarships. Great marks are not the only criterion; there are sports and volunteering scholarships, scholarships for minorities and even those given out by community clubs.
Filling out forms for government tuition assistance is a must. Many universities have a separate bursary application you can fill out to receive extra funding; however, they do take into consideration your government funding to determine your level of financial need.
I found a lot of scholarships through my high school. This is a great place to start because many universities will notify the high schools of the awards and scholarships available ahead of time. Talk to your guidance counsellors. They can point you in the right direction and even nominate you for special scholarships.
Start early, look everywhere and talk to everyone. Scholarship deadlines are spread out throughout the year and application deadlines can be as early as October or as late as April.
Make a timeline of everything you’ve done up to date. What clubs/sports are you in? Do you volunteer or have a job? Have you won any awards or held any leadership positions? All these factors are taken into account. Another important piece of advice is to make sure you have all necessary documents ready beforehand. Many scholarships will require reference letters, transcripts or written essays. Be prepared to know what is expected of you.
Don't rule out sports scholarships. Some Universities aren't supposed to have scholarships for a particular sport because the team isn't in the right Division, but in fact they do. Scouts recommend you and, surprise, you're offered an academic scholarship. The trick is that when the disguise their intent in this way, it only really binds the student to try out for the team, not necessarily to play all season. I'm sure you get the drift.
There are also scholarships for out-of-country students. Some are sports scholarships, others are – well in this University they're called “Diversity Scholarships”, because the school wants to increase the diversity of the student body. That's an opportunity for someone with an unusual background.
You may think applying for too many scholarships or bursaries will be impossibly time consuming. But for many, the essay questions are fairly similar. It might take you 3 hours to apply for the first one, but with the wonders of copying and pasting, it’ll take you only 1 hour to fill out subsequent applications.
Please don’t get discouraged if you aren’t awarded anything or as much as you would have hoped for. Keep in mind that there are others who are also applying. Don’t give up. You can do it. Just believe in yourself.
Gay Roommates
During my summer holidays, my uncle asked me if there was anything that made me think, uh oh, this is going to be hard to get used to. And yes, there most certainly was.
In my first year, I shared a suite with three guys, and I have assigned fictitious names for each for the purpose of this story. I was rooming with Dean, who was straight as was I. Then there was Dale who was very theatrical and gay, and Brian: well, would you call him religious?, ... or conservative?, ... or redneck?, ... or homophobic? Each of these sometimes seemed to apply. Neither Dale nor Brian was completely bad. Each had a serious side, a perceptive side, and a considerate side. But they didn't belong together.
Dale clearly wanted to be in college for the “college experience”. He partied every night and came home drunk out of his mind. Brian ended up coming out as gay three years later but at that time, you could only suspect what his real orientation was. We did: what made him so emphatic, so obsessed? As the Bard said, he “doth protest too much, methinks” (Hamlet Act 3, scene 2, 230, in case you were wondering.)
Brian was a fun-loving guy but he had grown up in an extremely religious community and he could say or do prejudiced things without realizing it; where he had come from, everyone was like him so he didn’t have a concept of what was offensive. He would do things like post racist posters on the wall, complete with ugly caricatures and offensive names for an entire ethnic group. (I won't repeat any of them here; they were unacceptable even between semi-consenting semi-adults in semi-private.) Brian would also write homophobic bible slogans on the whiteboard above where his gay roommate slept, such as: “You shall not lie with a male as those who lie with a female; it is an abomination”, and “If a man lies with a male as those who lie with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination and they shall surely be put to death”. Brian thought this kind of stuff was funny and okay.
It didn’t bother Dean and me that these guys were gay. Even so, Dale would sometimes do things with the sole intention of shocking me. Knowing full well that I wasn’t gay, he would come in late at night after I was in bed, exhausted after working late; he would shut the door, lock it and look at me and make a completely inappropriate suggestion which I can’t write down here or it won’t get published. I wasn’t worried that he was coming on to me and knew that he was just saying these things to get a rise out of me. The only response was to laugh, and I did. Like I say, he was theatrical.
Many of the things he did were with the intention of just having fun and trying to be funny; he was not directly trying to offend us. But he would also do really aggressive things that made Brian, the guy who hadn’t come out yet, uncomfortable. He had taken a particular interest in Brian; he was very suspicious of him, realized he was most likely gay, and found it completely absurd that Brian wasn’t admitting it. So he would specifically do things to offend him, like having sex in his bed with a male partner while Brian was there. If it was Dean or me, he wouldn't have done it. But Brian didn't seem to see anything wrong with offending Dale; in fact he revelled in it. That was a mistake, because Dale was much more creative, and could be much more offensive than Brian if he wanted to. And he did want to.
As a result, Brian and Dale developed a really antagonistic relationship. (Yeah, I know, Duh.) Brian would post a new homophobic bible slogan and Dale would do something new to make Brian feel really uncomfortable. It got so bad that Brian moved out halfway through the year because Dale was getting to him. An interesting twist was that, unbeknownst to him, his new roommate was bisexual.
I felt badly for Brian as this was an example of someone having to come and adjust to a new and unexpected situation. It must have been hard for him since he would have been conflicted, knowing he was gay and what all of his friends and family back home would have thought of that. It would have been difficult for someone from a protected environment who was inculcated with lots of things all his life that weren’t true, and which would conflict with the reality of certain situations, to come to terms with it.
I don’t really know what happened to Brian or Dale. While some of the drama could be pretty amusing, I really don’t miss it. But it did teach me lots about how people from different backgrounds can conflict with each other. Life would certainly be dull if everyone were the same and no one disagreed. And that first year was certainly not dull for me.
In my first year, I shared a suite with three guys, and I have assigned fictitious names for each for the purpose of this story. I was rooming with Dean, who was straight as was I. Then there was Dale who was very theatrical and gay, and Brian: well, would you call him religious?, ... or conservative?, ... or redneck?, ... or homophobic? Each of these sometimes seemed to apply. Neither Dale nor Brian was completely bad. Each had a serious side, a perceptive side, and a considerate side. But they didn't belong together.
Dale clearly wanted to be in college for the “college experience”. He partied every night and came home drunk out of his mind. Brian ended up coming out as gay three years later but at that time, you could only suspect what his real orientation was. We did: what made him so emphatic, so obsessed? As the Bard said, he “doth protest too much, methinks” (Hamlet Act 3, scene 2, 230, in case you were wondering.)
Brian was a fun-loving guy but he had grown up in an extremely religious community and he could say or do prejudiced things without realizing it; where he had come from, everyone was like him so he didn’t have a concept of what was offensive. He would do things like post racist posters on the wall, complete with ugly caricatures and offensive names for an entire ethnic group. (I won't repeat any of them here; they were unacceptable even between semi-consenting semi-adults in semi-private.) Brian would also write homophobic bible slogans on the whiteboard above where his gay roommate slept, such as: “You shall not lie with a male as those who lie with a female; it is an abomination”, and “If a man lies with a male as those who lie with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination and they shall surely be put to death”. Brian thought this kind of stuff was funny and okay.
It didn’t bother Dean and me that these guys were gay. Even so, Dale would sometimes do things with the sole intention of shocking me. Knowing full well that I wasn’t gay, he would come in late at night after I was in bed, exhausted after working late; he would shut the door, lock it and look at me and make a completely inappropriate suggestion which I can’t write down here or it won’t get published. I wasn’t worried that he was coming on to me and knew that he was just saying these things to get a rise out of me. The only response was to laugh, and I did. Like I say, he was theatrical.
Many of the things he did were with the intention of just having fun and trying to be funny; he was not directly trying to offend us. But he would also do really aggressive things that made Brian, the guy who hadn’t come out yet, uncomfortable. He had taken a particular interest in Brian; he was very suspicious of him, realized he was most likely gay, and found it completely absurd that Brian wasn’t admitting it. So he would specifically do things to offend him, like having sex in his bed with a male partner while Brian was there. If it was Dean or me, he wouldn't have done it. But Brian didn't seem to see anything wrong with offending Dale; in fact he revelled in it. That was a mistake, because Dale was much more creative, and could be much more offensive than Brian if he wanted to. And he did want to.
As a result, Brian and Dale developed a really antagonistic relationship. (Yeah, I know, Duh.) Brian would post a new homophobic bible slogan and Dale would do something new to make Brian feel really uncomfortable. It got so bad that Brian moved out halfway through the year because Dale was getting to him. An interesting twist was that, unbeknownst to him, his new roommate was bisexual.
I felt badly for Brian as this was an example of someone having to come and adjust to a new and unexpected situation. It must have been hard for him since he would have been conflicted, knowing he was gay and what all of his friends and family back home would have thought of that. It would have been difficult for someone from a protected environment who was inculcated with lots of things all his life that weren’t true, and which would conflict with the reality of certain situations, to come to terms with it.
I don’t really know what happened to Brian or Dale. While some of the drama could be pretty amusing, I really don’t miss it. But it did teach me lots about how people from different backgrounds can conflict with each other. Life would certainly be dull if everyone were the same and no one disagreed. And that first year was certainly not dull for me.
Friends
You will meet a lot of people and make a lot of new friends while you are at University. A lot of this will happen in first year while you are in residence.
Friends are good. They make long days less boring, they make studying for exams more interesting, and basically they just make your university experience more memorable. Friends can also be live savers, in terms of helping you get through problems you are having at home or school. They can be the person you go talk to.
Don’t be afraid to meet people you have never met before who come from different backgrounds. You can learn a lot from them. You may also clash with people you meet. Be willing to be open minded. You may end up having very different friends than you did in high school. I tend to be more of a conservative person and the people I ended up spending most of my time with were not. We were able to get past that. I didn't do anything I wasn't comfortable with, and they accepted that and didn't try to do everything I did.
Friends can also be quite detrimental. Some of them are more interested in partying and having a good time as opposed to going to classes and performing well. They tempt you. You need to be strong and be able to say “no” to things that you do not want to do and make sure that you look out for yourself. Hanging out with your friends may be more exciting than going to that psychology lecture, but during that lecture, the Prof might be reviewing what will be on the exam.
Don’t forget the friends you had back at home either. Call them and see what’s up. They might be able to help you out in some way, but in any case you've been close to them in the past, and it's worthwhile to maintain that closeness.
Sometimes what brings two people together is what they have in common. I was underage for nearly all my first year in university. Another person who I lived with who was also underage at the time. We bonded instantly because of that common ground. While the others were out, we would go do other things together. Unfortunately she became of age several months before I did, and she ended up ditching me. That happens sometimes, but the times we did have together were great.
I grew up in a small town and went to a small school. Up until this year, most of the people I would meet during the day would be people I'd known for most of my life. Now, when I went away, I was forced to make new friends. I was nervous about it, but I did it. In comparable circumstances now, I wouldn't be nervous at all; I have my new friends to thank for that.
Friends are good. They make long days less boring, they make studying for exams more interesting, and basically they just make your university experience more memorable. Friends can also be live savers, in terms of helping you get through problems you are having at home or school. They can be the person you go talk to.
Don’t be afraid to meet people you have never met before who come from different backgrounds. You can learn a lot from them. You may also clash with people you meet. Be willing to be open minded. You may end up having very different friends than you did in high school. I tend to be more of a conservative person and the people I ended up spending most of my time with were not. We were able to get past that. I didn't do anything I wasn't comfortable with, and they accepted that and didn't try to do everything I did.
Friends can also be quite detrimental. Some of them are more interested in partying and having a good time as opposed to going to classes and performing well. They tempt you. You need to be strong and be able to say “no” to things that you do not want to do and make sure that you look out for yourself. Hanging out with your friends may be more exciting than going to that psychology lecture, but during that lecture, the Prof might be reviewing what will be on the exam.
Don’t forget the friends you had back at home either. Call them and see what’s up. They might be able to help you out in some way, but in any case you've been close to them in the past, and it's worthwhile to maintain that closeness.
Sometimes what brings two people together is what they have in common. I was underage for nearly all my first year in university. Another person who I lived with who was also underage at the time. We bonded instantly because of that common ground. While the others were out, we would go do other things together. Unfortunately she became of age several months before I did, and she ended up ditching me. That happens sometimes, but the times we did have together were great.
I grew up in a small town and went to a small school. Up until this year, most of the people I would meet during the day would be people I'd known for most of my life. Now, when I went away, I was forced to make new friends. I was nervous about it, but I did it. In comparable circumstances now, I wouldn't be nervous at all; I have my new friends to thank for that.
Life in the Bubble
If you’re a student at this University, chances are you will be familiar with the term “the University Bubble”. Although you do become more independent and have more freedom in university, life as an undergrad is far from life in the real world.
Sometimes you get so caught up in partying, clubbing, studying and classes that you tend to forget about the world around you. That's inevitable up to a point, but it's too easy to take it to an extreme, so that for weeks at a time you forget that there are living beings at all outside the University. Being downtown in a big city would remind you about the rest of the world, at least as compared with life here; it's a self-contained campus quite a distance from anywhere else especially for students without a car, which includes me and most of my friends. The Bubble gets to surround you and consume you before you realize that anything is happening. Then it can be too late: nothing outside your immediate life seems to have any interest or any meaning. As I write this, a recession is in full swing, there are crowds in the street in a volatile and dangerous part of the world, and there's a ship carrying an apparently nuclear cargo to a country embargoed by the UN. A war could start this afternoon, and many of my friends have no idea of any of this; they would ignore you if you tried to tell them about it. It doesn't take much thinking to realize that this isolation is not a good thing.
For some, the program you're in can contribute to the Bubble effect. My own program is an example, in the Sciences. It's all very specialized, esoteric, and all-consuming, and nothing in our daily grind has anything at all immediately to do with the world outside the lecture hall and the labs.
So how to keep at least part of yourself outside the Bubble: even doing simple stuff like reading the newspaper regularly or listening to the news on the radio will keep you informed of important events in the rest of the world. If that seems to lose its interest and importance, you're on a downhill slide into the Bubble. (Mixed metaphors anyone?)
The University itself has lots of activities that have an outside focus. You might not think so, but as young adults we can change the future for the better, and this change can begin by what we do in university. Even getting involved in organizing or participating in a fundraiser such as a marathon, a relay, or a carwash or a barbecue for charity can broaden your Bubble-restricted vision -- especially if you get involved in the organization and get some idea of what the fund-raiser is for. To date, this University's freshman efforts have raised over two million dollars for local causes. It goes to show how much goodness can be accomplished when we all band together.
For a broader perspective, I joined Unicef and the Cancer Society this year so I could help other communities and people. Your commitment can change peoples’ lives.
You can give your summers an outside focus too, even if you circumstances are like mine, and you have no choice to stay on campus because home is too far away or you don't have anywhere at all to go to. You've paid for your room for the whole year too. This summer, I'll be working at the medical research lab on campus.
So beware of the insidious Bubble. If you feel it coming on to you, brainstorm, investigate possibilities for remedial activities, and take action!
Sometimes you get so caught up in partying, clubbing, studying and classes that you tend to forget about the world around you. That's inevitable up to a point, but it's too easy to take it to an extreme, so that for weeks at a time you forget that there are living beings at all outside the University. Being downtown in a big city would remind you about the rest of the world, at least as compared with life here; it's a self-contained campus quite a distance from anywhere else especially for students without a car, which includes me and most of my friends. The Bubble gets to surround you and consume you before you realize that anything is happening. Then it can be too late: nothing outside your immediate life seems to have any interest or any meaning. As I write this, a recession is in full swing, there are crowds in the street in a volatile and dangerous part of the world, and there's a ship carrying an apparently nuclear cargo to a country embargoed by the UN. A war could start this afternoon, and many of my friends have no idea of any of this; they would ignore you if you tried to tell them about it. It doesn't take much thinking to realize that this isolation is not a good thing.
For some, the program you're in can contribute to the Bubble effect. My own program is an example, in the Sciences. It's all very specialized, esoteric, and all-consuming, and nothing in our daily grind has anything at all immediately to do with the world outside the lecture hall and the labs.
So how to keep at least part of yourself outside the Bubble: even doing simple stuff like reading the newspaper regularly or listening to the news on the radio will keep you informed of important events in the rest of the world. If that seems to lose its interest and importance, you're on a downhill slide into the Bubble. (Mixed metaphors anyone?)
The University itself has lots of activities that have an outside focus. You might not think so, but as young adults we can change the future for the better, and this change can begin by what we do in university. Even getting involved in organizing or participating in a fundraiser such as a marathon, a relay, or a carwash or a barbecue for charity can broaden your Bubble-restricted vision -- especially if you get involved in the organization and get some idea of what the fund-raiser is for. To date, this University's freshman efforts have raised over two million dollars for local causes. It goes to show how much goodness can be accomplished when we all band together.
For a broader perspective, I joined Unicef and the Cancer Society this year so I could help other communities and people. Your commitment can change peoples’ lives.
You can give your summers an outside focus too, even if you circumstances are like mine, and you have no choice to stay on campus because home is too far away or you don't have anywhere at all to go to. You've paid for your room for the whole year too. This summer, I'll be working at the medical research lab on campus.
So beware of the insidious Bubble. If you feel it coming on to you, brainstorm, investigate possibilities for remedial activities, and take action!
Tuesday, June 23, 2009
Residence is a Class in Social Living
In Residence, you're living with people you've never met before, didn't choose to live with, and who might have very different habits from you. Yet you have to get along with them just the same.
I have three siblings, so I'm used to sharing space. But the hardest type of person for me to share space with is the very kind this University seems to attract: spoiled rich princesses. Their problem is that they're used to having parents or maids pick up after them. They do things like put plates of chicken bones outside their door, thinking they will magically disappear by themselves. Really, who thinks this way? Spoiled rich princesses, that's who. Picture their lives: they brag about how big their house is, how much stuff and how much money they have, how many exotic places they've visited, and how much richer and better than everyone else they are. And then they behave like idiots because they expect things to be the same here; especially that others should do their dishes and pick up their garbage.
I’m sure it's hard for them. But I think it's even harder for the people who are used to sharing to live with these people who aren't.
Then there are the bizarre things some of these girls will say. We had a floor meeting once where a couple of them brought up the fact that they didn’t think the quality of soap in the bathroom was good enough, and the toilet paper wasn't the proper type.
Ironically, one of the things I was most looking forward to at this University was living in residence. Contrary to the archetypical undergrad stereotype, it wasn’t the late night partying scene I was looking forward to, but the independence and freedom. Don’t get me wrong, I love my family, but a part of going to university is growing up. I looked forward to meeting new people from all walks of life and faculties.
At first, I was excited about it all: the energy and the friendliness of people in my residence. But soon I began to notice the many different personalities that took getting used to. While living in residence has given me the opportunity to meet so many interesting people, I've learned that you can't get along with everyone.
Again, don't get me wrong. University Life is everything I expected and more. So intermingle with others and don't get too frustrated when you get home from a full day of classes and arrive at the next one: at home, your class in Social Living.
I have three siblings, so I'm used to sharing space. But the hardest type of person for me to share space with is the very kind this University seems to attract: spoiled rich princesses. Their problem is that they're used to having parents or maids pick up after them. They do things like put plates of chicken bones outside their door, thinking they will magically disappear by themselves. Really, who thinks this way? Spoiled rich princesses, that's who. Picture their lives: they brag about how big their house is, how much stuff and how much money they have, how many exotic places they've visited, and how much richer and better than everyone else they are. And then they behave like idiots because they expect things to be the same here; especially that others should do their dishes and pick up their garbage.
I’m sure it's hard for them. But I think it's even harder for the people who are used to sharing to live with these people who aren't.
Then there are the bizarre things some of these girls will say. We had a floor meeting once where a couple of them brought up the fact that they didn’t think the quality of soap in the bathroom was good enough, and the toilet paper wasn't the proper type.
Ironically, one of the things I was most looking forward to at this University was living in residence. Contrary to the archetypical undergrad stereotype, it wasn’t the late night partying scene I was looking forward to, but the independence and freedom. Don’t get me wrong, I love my family, but a part of going to university is growing up. I looked forward to meeting new people from all walks of life and faculties.
At first, I was excited about it all: the energy and the friendliness of people in my residence. But soon I began to notice the many different personalities that took getting used to. While living in residence has given me the opportunity to meet so many interesting people, I've learned that you can't get along with everyone.
Again, don't get me wrong. University Life is everything I expected and more. So intermingle with others and don't get too frustrated when you get home from a full day of classes and arrive at the next one: at home, your class in Social Living.
Coping With Workload
Our program is the most demanding one in the University, but it works a little differently from other high-workload programs in various universities I've heard about before. Here, the demands are just constantly coming at you. The core of our program is a class called Studio, which runs three to four hours each day. Actually, I've forgotten exactly how long it's supposed to be because no-one leaves until long after it has "finished". Profs often stay there for a long time too, which we appreciate because of the help they can give you and the things you learn just by hearing some of their insights into the particular projects people are doing at the time. Studio is a big area, with up to 100 people there at the same time. We have other classes as well, but the portfolio you build up in Studio matters more; you really need it in order to get a job when you finish here.
In the first year, typically, you'll be given some work on Tuesday, say, which has to be completed in a couple of days, on the Thursday. So there's not much opportunity for procrastination. Actually, we used to joke that it's constant forced procrastination: you can't even begin on the work for Thursday, because there's only just enough time to get the work for Wednesday completed. So by the time you even begin the Thursday stuff, the time available for it has already shrunk so much that you have to hurry again to get it done in time. You are always doing things at the last minute -- not because you put it off, but because there is so much work that you have to work constantly to get all of it done. It can happen that time just runs out, and either you have to throw something together at the last minute or even, in the worst case, just not do it.
The idea of this curriculum is that the Profs are progressively making you more and more self-reliant. Second year, the deadline will be a week instead of two days; third year, two weeks. By your final year, your entire term is spent on one project. But by now, you will have developed the skills necessary to pace yourself.
I find it is like two different worlds inside and outside of this faculty. The typical college scenario seems to be one of procrastination and putting things off. For us, that's not an option. There is just no time. We can never just let things slide – that's passive procrastination, and disaster would promptly ensue. What we have to do is active procrastination, which we often think of as “true procrastination”, and which we have to become masters of. We decide, usually collectively, that we've had enough, and we're going to pretend we're just ordinary University students out to have a good time. We need to have a purpose for procrastinating and we have to be successful at procrastinating: when it's over, our real life of constant demands and frantic work begins once more. Procrastination becomes a series of discrete episodes rather than a state of mind.
In our program, you can't do a competitive sport. There wouldn't be time. But people do find a way to play, and do recreational activities like ultimate frisbee. A couple of friends and I started a theatre group. It was interesting, and it was a new thing: theatre for people who don't have time. Other people may do the Arts and Adventure group, or the Citizenship and Community group. Each involves a theme, and people participate in activities around the theme. Some people join Fraternities and Sororities. Not the ones who get good marks, though. One thing the University doesn’t do is house all of us together. At first, I might have preferred if they had. But two weeks into the program, I realized it was better this way, or nobody would be there for most of the time, and ours would have been a ghost dorm.
Back to Studio. A lot of people purposely sacrifice other classes for the sake of Studio because they perceive that these are the marks that will count. But that’s not necessarily wise; the university attaches the same weight to one credit as to another, and some of these other courses are compulsory; they're part of what you need to graduate. Studio is perpetually immediate. You are constantly working as hard as you can just to keep up. It's a pretty overwhelming feeling to realize that you have to make time for work in one of the other courses as well. Lots of people keep putting it off; they don't know how to time manage so they don't do the work for the other classes. Then, of course, they get a low mark.
We do most of the work in the Studio itself. It's open all the time, and the actual class lasts for four hours a day. But there's always a good number of people there. The only no-man's zone is between 4 am and 6 am: the late-night people have finally gone, and the early morning people aren't awake yet. Even so, there are still people there. Often they're working on a cumulative project, a project for which you have to do everything on your own from designing the project through to completing it, and it's a huge deal.
Eventually, your body gets used to the long hours. One thing worth mentioning is that if you are going to pull an all-nighter, it can be a bad thing to take a break or a nap; you know that as soon as you do, you're done for. So you just keep going. Other times, a break can be helpful because you can't focus, and you can't think about anything except taking a break so it can rejuvenate you. You just have to know yourself well enough to decide whether to take one or not. It's a cliche, but time-management and staying focused are skills people say they have developed. You do get used to all the work and sometimes it’s the pressure that helps you work faster and time manage better. Working without nearly enough sleep, though, is one of those things that when you've done it enough, you can kind of zombie into it. It's terrible really, how normal it can become.
For me, working for weeks at a time without any real break and without enough sleep is not the hardest thing because there is no choice involved. It’s the times when the extreme demands are sporadic that are a real problem. Then I’m not used to the all-nighters, and the gear-switching becomes difficult. I have to tell myself that I need to sacrifice my free time to do some work. When I haven't had any free time for several weeks, I forget what it's like; maybe I'm half miserable all the time, but at least I'm used to it. Some people find that a project they've come up with needs them to work 24 hours for days at a time. The only way to do that is to take amphetamines, so that's what they have to do. It’s very common here and I didn’t expect that, maybe because I came from a place where I didn’t see much of that kind of thing.
Another problem is that in our program, there are two different kinds of work. One kind involves intensive thinking through a situation such as creating a design. But the other kind requires mechanical and repetitive work, often for hours at a time to finish the project. Both kinds of task are quite intense, and of course, there's never enough time. My brain gets out of sync. I might be in a creative mood, but that's not what I have to do at the time. Or I might be in a really dead mood, so the mechanical stuff would suit me, but I have to design something. What can help is to find a system where I have some of each kind to do. I have two things in process at the same time, one creative, the other mechanical. Then there are some options open.
People say they've developed the skills to cope with the workload. But then they can't tell you what the skills are, except in useless clichés like "You have to develop time-management strategies". I can't articulate it either. Maybe it's just a matter of living through it all and getting used to it. Then too, if you really want something enough, you'll find a way to do it.
In the first year, typically, you'll be given some work on Tuesday, say, which has to be completed in a couple of days, on the Thursday. So there's not much opportunity for procrastination. Actually, we used to joke that it's constant forced procrastination: you can't even begin on the work for Thursday, because there's only just enough time to get the work for Wednesday completed. So by the time you even begin the Thursday stuff, the time available for it has already shrunk so much that you have to hurry again to get it done in time. You are always doing things at the last minute -- not because you put it off, but because there is so much work that you have to work constantly to get all of it done. It can happen that time just runs out, and either you have to throw something together at the last minute or even, in the worst case, just not do it.
The idea of this curriculum is that the Profs are progressively making you more and more self-reliant. Second year, the deadline will be a week instead of two days; third year, two weeks. By your final year, your entire term is spent on one project. But by now, you will have developed the skills necessary to pace yourself.
I find it is like two different worlds inside and outside of this faculty. The typical college scenario seems to be one of procrastination and putting things off. For us, that's not an option. There is just no time. We can never just let things slide – that's passive procrastination, and disaster would promptly ensue. What we have to do is active procrastination, which we often think of as “true procrastination”, and which we have to become masters of. We decide, usually collectively, that we've had enough, and we're going to pretend we're just ordinary University students out to have a good time. We need to have a purpose for procrastinating and we have to be successful at procrastinating: when it's over, our real life of constant demands and frantic work begins once more. Procrastination becomes a series of discrete episodes rather than a state of mind.
In our program, you can't do a competitive sport. There wouldn't be time. But people do find a way to play, and do recreational activities like ultimate frisbee. A couple of friends and I started a theatre group. It was interesting, and it was a new thing: theatre for people who don't have time. Other people may do the Arts and Adventure group, or the Citizenship and Community group. Each involves a theme, and people participate in activities around the theme. Some people join Fraternities and Sororities. Not the ones who get good marks, though. One thing the University doesn’t do is house all of us together. At first, I might have preferred if they had. But two weeks into the program, I realized it was better this way, or nobody would be there for most of the time, and ours would have been a ghost dorm.
Back to Studio. A lot of people purposely sacrifice other classes for the sake of Studio because they perceive that these are the marks that will count. But that’s not necessarily wise; the university attaches the same weight to one credit as to another, and some of these other courses are compulsory; they're part of what you need to graduate. Studio is perpetually immediate. You are constantly working as hard as you can just to keep up. It's a pretty overwhelming feeling to realize that you have to make time for work in one of the other courses as well. Lots of people keep putting it off; they don't know how to time manage so they don't do the work for the other classes. Then, of course, they get a low mark.
We do most of the work in the Studio itself. It's open all the time, and the actual class lasts for four hours a day. But there's always a good number of people there. The only no-man's zone is between 4 am and 6 am: the late-night people have finally gone, and the early morning people aren't awake yet. Even so, there are still people there. Often they're working on a cumulative project, a project for which you have to do everything on your own from designing the project through to completing it, and it's a huge deal.
Eventually, your body gets used to the long hours. One thing worth mentioning is that if you are going to pull an all-nighter, it can be a bad thing to take a break or a nap; you know that as soon as you do, you're done for. So you just keep going. Other times, a break can be helpful because you can't focus, and you can't think about anything except taking a break so it can rejuvenate you. You just have to know yourself well enough to decide whether to take one or not. It's a cliche, but time-management and staying focused are skills people say they have developed. You do get used to all the work and sometimes it’s the pressure that helps you work faster and time manage better. Working without nearly enough sleep, though, is one of those things that when you've done it enough, you can kind of zombie into it. It's terrible really, how normal it can become.
For me, working for weeks at a time without any real break and without enough sleep is not the hardest thing because there is no choice involved. It’s the times when the extreme demands are sporadic that are a real problem. Then I’m not used to the all-nighters, and the gear-switching becomes difficult. I have to tell myself that I need to sacrifice my free time to do some work. When I haven't had any free time for several weeks, I forget what it's like; maybe I'm half miserable all the time, but at least I'm used to it. Some people find that a project they've come up with needs them to work 24 hours for days at a time. The only way to do that is to take amphetamines, so that's what they have to do. It’s very common here and I didn’t expect that, maybe because I came from a place where I didn’t see much of that kind of thing.
Another problem is that in our program, there are two different kinds of work. One kind involves intensive thinking through a situation such as creating a design. But the other kind requires mechanical and repetitive work, often for hours at a time to finish the project. Both kinds of task are quite intense, and of course, there's never enough time. My brain gets out of sync. I might be in a creative mood, but that's not what I have to do at the time. Or I might be in a really dead mood, so the mechanical stuff would suit me, but I have to design something. What can help is to find a system where I have some of each kind to do. I have two things in process at the same time, one creative, the other mechanical. Then there are some options open.
People say they've developed the skills to cope with the workload. But then they can't tell you what the skills are, except in useless clichés like "You have to develop time-management strategies". I can't articulate it either. Maybe it's just a matter of living through it all and getting used to it. Then too, if you really want something enough, you'll find a way to do it.
Final Evaluations
Many of our classes do not have required exams but project reviews or assignments instead. For the rest of our timetable, around the time that our other courses have exams, we're supposed to have a small break. However, it doesn't seem to work; it all just carries on regardless. Each Prof continues to make large demands on your time, and it is difficult to begin exam study early enough, or to do it thoroughly enough, for you to do as well as you otherwise could. If everyone has the same schedule though, there can be power in numbers if you take advantage of it. It has happened that we all cried out to the Prof who seemed to have forgotten about the exams: "Stop, you know us; you know we're not whiners, but give us a break just for this week!" And then some students catch on to that and try this technique later on when our timetables are more diverse, the student front isn’t unified and the power isn’t there. Then it degenerates into a sad, droning whine.
Another part of our evaluation is the Review, which is a project presentation and discussion. We work on it for weeks, put it on the wall or make a presentation of it, and then present it to the entire class, the Prof, and maybe other Profs or people outside the school as well. After your presentation, there are questions and comments you're expected to respond to.
Sometimes the comments seem frustratingly unconcerned with what you had perceived as the topic of your Review. Your first reaction might be annoyance that the person hasn't caught on to what you were trying to do. It's not advisable to respond in that way, though. You have to say something intelligent, so you need to put an emotional distance between you and the situation. One of the purposes of the exercise is to broaden your horizons on your work, and to stimulate ideas which otherwise you might not have had. So when they raise questions that you hadn't thought about, you have to respond by drawing a connection. You can say something like, "I hadn't thought of it from that viewpoint, but yes, I can see that the effect of that might be..." If you can do that intelligently, it can actually help you. Other times though, the question you're asked can be so far out of whack that all you can say is, "No, I hadn't thought of that."
It pays to get to know the Profs. They all have things they regard as important, and with some, it seems that they have an agenda all their own. So you know that they'll be pleased if you approach the topic from a direction that's at least consistent with their point of view.
A good thing about this way of doing things is that when you make your presentation, you're the expert on the topic. It could well be that you know more than anyone else in the room, including the Profs. More and more as you go on in the discipline, the Review becomes something like an equal conversation. The project you have is not a simple one; it's complicated, and there isn't an easy solution. You are basically a practitioner, and the difference between you and the Profs is that they have done more of it than you have. But on your topic, it's more of a conversation between equals. The Profs, and they accept it, are learning from you as well as the other way
It's a tense time though, overall, because so much is being evaluated in so short a time, and if you get off on the wrong foot, it can be very hard to regain control of the situation. That would be true of an exam as well. But in the Review, a lot depends not just on how good your actual work is, but on how you present it. Things happen in the Review that can totally throw you off guard in a way that wouldn't be so in an exam. Your reaction to what comes across as an off-track question can antagonize people. Or you can say something stupid. In an exam, you could just erase it; if you've said it, and everyone has heard, it's not so easy.
But I can't imagine a program like ours that didn't have something like our Review. It captures aspects of our ability and our achievement that a mere exam could never do.
Another part of our evaluation is the Review, which is a project presentation and discussion. We work on it for weeks, put it on the wall or make a presentation of it, and then present it to the entire class, the Prof, and maybe other Profs or people outside the school as well. After your presentation, there are questions and comments you're expected to respond to.
Sometimes the comments seem frustratingly unconcerned with what you had perceived as the topic of your Review. Your first reaction might be annoyance that the person hasn't caught on to what you were trying to do. It's not advisable to respond in that way, though. You have to say something intelligent, so you need to put an emotional distance between you and the situation. One of the purposes of the exercise is to broaden your horizons on your work, and to stimulate ideas which otherwise you might not have had. So when they raise questions that you hadn't thought about, you have to respond by drawing a connection. You can say something like, "I hadn't thought of it from that viewpoint, but yes, I can see that the effect of that might be..." If you can do that intelligently, it can actually help you. Other times though, the question you're asked can be so far out of whack that all you can say is, "No, I hadn't thought of that."
It pays to get to know the Profs. They all have things they regard as important, and with some, it seems that they have an agenda all their own. So you know that they'll be pleased if you approach the topic from a direction that's at least consistent with their point of view.
A good thing about this way of doing things is that when you make your presentation, you're the expert on the topic. It could well be that you know more than anyone else in the room, including the Profs. More and more as you go on in the discipline, the Review becomes something like an equal conversation. The project you have is not a simple one; it's complicated, and there isn't an easy solution. You are basically a practitioner, and the difference between you and the Profs is that they have done more of it than you have. But on your topic, it's more of a conversation between equals. The Profs, and they accept it, are learning from you as well as the other way
It's a tense time though, overall, because so much is being evaluated in so short a time, and if you get off on the wrong foot, it can be very hard to regain control of the situation. That would be true of an exam as well. But in the Review, a lot depends not just on how good your actual work is, but on how you present it. Things happen in the Review that can totally throw you off guard in a way that wouldn't be so in an exam. Your reaction to what comes across as an off-track question can antagonize people. Or you can say something stupid. In an exam, you could just erase it; if you've said it, and everyone has heard, it's not so easy.
But I can't imagine a program like ours that didn't have something like our Review. It captures aspects of our ability and our achievement that a mere exam could never do.
Grading
Grading in our Program is different from most others. There's no right and wrong, just good, better, best... and sometimes not good enough! Grading has to be subjective, which of course means that there are times when people don’t agree with it.
A disappointing grade is frustrating when you’ve handed something in after staying up late to do it and you've given it everything you’ve got. It has everything in it that you can do, within the limited topic or theme you're given, and it's complete as far as it can be. At least, that's how you see it. You have a sense of ownership of it, even an emotional attachment to it. That makes it easy to want to defend or explain your work when someone offers criticism, when they have things to say other than what a wonderful thing it is and how it couldn’t be improved upon. Even if something is said that could be construed as an additional point, it can come across as a criticism of you for not having thought to put it in. You do have to get used to that. But you have to take these criticisms courteously and realize that engaging your critics creates a dialogue that can actually benefit you and your work, that not every comment is a criticism, and the Prof is showing you respect by listening to what you have to say and reacting thoughtfully to it. Some Profs are better giving constructive criticism than others but we learn to take it all in stride, in public at least.
I'm not the kind of person who says that the Prof must be wrong because I didn't get a mark as high as I would have liked. But what I don't like is that sometimes a person who I don't feel is as qualified gets to grade my work.
A lot of grading is done by grad students who are teaching assistants, more commonly referred to as TAs. Some of them have graduated from programs less demanding than ours. Others have specialized in an area dissimilar to our program. In both cases, the TA is no more informed on our work than we are. So there are times when they have difficulties reviewing our assignments, causing a lack in credibility on their part.
I can think of one instance when my TA was just plain lazy and simple minded. He had received his undergraduate degree in something much less rigorous than this program. His ideas were uninspiring and he spent more time discussing his years as a party animal frat boy than anything else. It was frustrating to take criticism from someone who was never given such assignments in his program. He was just grading according to how our Prof had instructed him and even some of that he didn't follow properly. In this program, we put everything we have into our work, and we can be resentful when someone like this has so much influence over our grades.
For the most part, the TAs do care about assisting us, however, there are always a few duds in the group. Luckily, the Prof is responsible for the content taught and the final say in the grading process. That's good, because all our Profs are people we respect. In the end, I'm confident that my grade will reflect my ability and the work I've done, and that it will be as fair as it could be.
A disappointing grade is frustrating when you’ve handed something in after staying up late to do it and you've given it everything you’ve got. It has everything in it that you can do, within the limited topic or theme you're given, and it's complete as far as it can be. At least, that's how you see it. You have a sense of ownership of it, even an emotional attachment to it. That makes it easy to want to defend or explain your work when someone offers criticism, when they have things to say other than what a wonderful thing it is and how it couldn’t be improved upon. Even if something is said that could be construed as an additional point, it can come across as a criticism of you for not having thought to put it in. You do have to get used to that. But you have to take these criticisms courteously and realize that engaging your critics creates a dialogue that can actually benefit you and your work, that not every comment is a criticism, and the Prof is showing you respect by listening to what you have to say and reacting thoughtfully to it. Some Profs are better giving constructive criticism than others but we learn to take it all in stride, in public at least.
I'm not the kind of person who says that the Prof must be wrong because I didn't get a mark as high as I would have liked. But what I don't like is that sometimes a person who I don't feel is as qualified gets to grade my work.
A lot of grading is done by grad students who are teaching assistants, more commonly referred to as TAs. Some of them have graduated from programs less demanding than ours. Others have specialized in an area dissimilar to our program. In both cases, the TA is no more informed on our work than we are. So there are times when they have difficulties reviewing our assignments, causing a lack in credibility on their part.
I can think of one instance when my TA was just plain lazy and simple minded. He had received his undergraduate degree in something much less rigorous than this program. His ideas were uninspiring and he spent more time discussing his years as a party animal frat boy than anything else. It was frustrating to take criticism from someone who was never given such assignments in his program. He was just grading according to how our Prof had instructed him and even some of that he didn't follow properly. In this program, we put everything we have into our work, and we can be resentful when someone like this has so much influence over our grades.
For the most part, the TAs do care about assisting us, however, there are always a few duds in the group. Luckily, the Prof is responsible for the content taught and the final say in the grading process. That's good, because all our Profs are people we respect. In the end, I'm confident that my grade will reflect my ability and the work I've done, and that it will be as fair as it could be.
Students Who Waste Their Time
I’m in a program that’s probably the most demanding one the University offers. In fact, this faculty is almost like a school within a school; there's the rest of the University, then there's us. And we're not the only ones who see it that way. If you ask anyone else in the University, they'll tell you the same thing.
We have to work so hard that mostly there’s not much time left over. Sometimes it gets to the point that it’s even hard to get just a few hours of sleep. And because of the nature of the program, most of it has to be done at the Faculty itself. What they say about us is true: our faces are all so pale because we really don’t get out much.
There do seem to be lots of people around though, in other faculties, with far too much time on their hands. It can be hard to take: sometimes people breeze through our working area on their way to the pub. They make a lot of noise, joke around, and then go on their way. We can’t go; for us there just isn’t the time.
It can be rather deceiving. There was one student I worked with in a theatre production who seemed to have a pretty laid-back life. But then later, when her projects came up, she had to work really hard.
But if you’re not seeing that, it can seem unfair that other people have so much time to goof off. Especially, it’s hard to take some of their complaints, their whining. They complain that they have to take amphetamines to get their work done, whereas in fact the real problem is that they’ve been sleeping all the time and going out a lot.
They’re disorganized as well. In our program, we stay up late working. But these students exaggerate; they claim to be working all evening and into the night, but in fact they are mostly chatting, singing and Facebooking. They complain about having to stay up, but they didn’t actually do very much work. They go to their Profs for extensions, `Poor me; I’m just so stressed out with the workload’, whereas the truth is that they wasted time all month and then spent the last couple of days getting over their hangovers. It’s hard not to be impatient with them. My feeling is that you shouldn’t get to say you worked all evening and into the night if you didn’t actually do that. Putting forward the maximum possible effort, and going beyond what has previously seemed possible: when you're feeling you're the genuine article, it's hard to have a lot of patience with people who obviously aren't.
But then I think, they’re getting back about what they’re putting in. Our program leads to a professional life, but theirs doesn’t lead anywhere much unless they make it happen, which they’re not doing. During their years here, they’re just wasting their time and their considerable tuition dollars away. I wonder what they are doing with their lives. When I remind myself of that, I’m not jealous of their life at all.
We have to work so hard that mostly there’s not much time left over. Sometimes it gets to the point that it’s even hard to get just a few hours of sleep. And because of the nature of the program, most of it has to be done at the Faculty itself. What they say about us is true: our faces are all so pale because we really don’t get out much.
There do seem to be lots of people around though, in other faculties, with far too much time on their hands. It can be hard to take: sometimes people breeze through our working area on their way to the pub. They make a lot of noise, joke around, and then go on their way. We can’t go; for us there just isn’t the time.
It can be rather deceiving. There was one student I worked with in a theatre production who seemed to have a pretty laid-back life. But then later, when her projects came up, she had to work really hard.
But if you’re not seeing that, it can seem unfair that other people have so much time to goof off. Especially, it’s hard to take some of their complaints, their whining. They complain that they have to take amphetamines to get their work done, whereas in fact the real problem is that they’ve been sleeping all the time and going out a lot.
They’re disorganized as well. In our program, we stay up late working. But these students exaggerate; they claim to be working all evening and into the night, but in fact they are mostly chatting, singing and Facebooking. They complain about having to stay up, but they didn’t actually do very much work. They go to their Profs for extensions, `Poor me; I’m just so stressed out with the workload’, whereas the truth is that they wasted time all month and then spent the last couple of days getting over their hangovers. It’s hard not to be impatient with them. My feeling is that you shouldn’t get to say you worked all evening and into the night if you didn’t actually do that. Putting forward the maximum possible effort, and going beyond what has previously seemed possible: when you're feeling you're the genuine article, it's hard to have a lot of patience with people who obviously aren't.
But then I think, they’re getting back about what they’re putting in. Our program leads to a professional life, but theirs doesn’t lead anywhere much unless they make it happen, which they’re not doing. During their years here, they’re just wasting their time and their considerable tuition dollars away. I wonder what they are doing with their lives. When I remind myself of that, I’m not jealous of their life at all.
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