My first year of uni has just finished, and I’ve somehow managed to get stuck in a mood dominated by anxiety, intellectual stress and low self-esteem. This is pretty much how I’ve felt throughout this academic year, and now that the summer holiday is here, I can’t seem to snap out of the fear of ‘this assignment needs to be done, do I have enough credits to pass?’. Jokes aside, I didn’t have that bad of a year. I’ve never got in the danger of not passing, and actually, I’ve had pretty decent grades, fairly high averages on all my modules, and positive feedback from the tutors I worked with. But still, this weird mix of feelings wouldn’t go away. You got it, I’m scarred for life.
Beyond this general worry of not being good enough and not being able to stay above water, university did leave me with so much more. It is just the beginning of my journey, and yet, I’ve learned a bit about how higher education is supposed to function and what is expected of me as a consequence. After eight months of swimming around in this environment (so many water metaphors today), I can safely say that university is simultaneously the most overrated and the most underrated experience one might ever come across. Both nerve-racking and comfortably broad, university has overturned all my anticipations and forced me to dramatically change my self-discipline and work ethic. Throughout these last eight months, I’ve grown up mentally, and I would like to share my scholarly epiphanies with you.
These are six things that university has taught me and that I am now passing on to you. Although you won’t believe them until you actually live them yourself.
Also, disclaimer: I am currently studying in the UK and I am speaking only for the experience with higher education I’ve had in this country.
1) Privilege and luck land people into university more than academic achievements do.
Sounds depressing and patronising, but it is true. You honestly don’t need the brains to get into uni, and by that I don’t mean that people who actually perform academically won’t make it into higher education. As somebody who has done her best to meet the entry requirements imposed by my first choice university, I’ve seen people being accepted despite not getting the grades they needed. Heck, I’ve even seen people coming here to study despite not knowing how to speak English. I’ve shared desks with people who came to uni without knowing what modules they’re taking or if they are even interested in making it to next year. I am not saying, don’t bother. I am also not trying to tell apart who deserves to be in uni and who doesn’t. Last but not least, I am not regretting my own efforts to grasp this educational opportunity. My point is, almost anyone can get in university if they are lucky enough.
I knew, once I stepped through these doors, that my fate was sealed.
(personal archive)
2) If you want good grades, you need to work for them.
Once you actually start higher education, the game changes. Studying at university is not complicated if you put all your energy and dedication into it. It is not about how difficult the concepts and theories that you are operating with are, but about how much effort and (not ironically) sleepless nights you are willing to put into accumulating and understanding information, and using it for writing that assignment or acing that exam paper. If you offer 100% of all you have, the quality of your work will be 100%. If you offer only 62%, well, expect a 62% on your last piece of coursework. Perfection is obviously unachievable, and sometimes, our performance is the best we can do at a certain moment, under the influence of a certain mindset. As somebody who grew comfortable with always being on top, always receiving praise and positive feedback on my academic work, I found university almost heartbreaking at the start. Suddenly, I wasn’t the best student in my class anymore, I was struggling to achieve a good academic writing style, and knowing a lot of information was no longer my safety net when it came to writing a paper or doing a presentation. I was disappointed, then angry, then down in the dumps again, yes, but I’ve achieved the motivation that I needed to get back up, dust off and carry on by putting the greatest amount of effort I was capable of into studying. The feeling of satisfaction that I got with every good grade couldn’t be compared to anything else. Before this turns into a life-coaching inspirational speech, go and do your best and get those grades that you’ve always wanted.
3) Studying is individual effort that only starts in a lecture hall.
In a nutshell, high school is easy-peasy. You go to class six hours a day, five days a week, and study under the guidance of a teacher who makes sure you have a) all you need to know to do homework and pass exams, b) the reading list that supports your learning in class, c) pretty much all you need to do to pass and move on, feeling safe now that you know the core theory of a subject you will definitely not use further in life. University is kind of the opposite. You do have teachers, classes you should attend (although I kid you not, attendance might be monitored, but a lot of students don’t really care), textbooks you are supposed to use and a reading list you should go through. All these things do not actually escort you through the magical land of education, though. Studying is your own responsibility, and it is up to you whether you actually learn something or not. You feel like you didn’t understand some of the concepts introduced in the lecture? Ask your tutor about it, or stay in total ignorance forever. You need to write a paper and you need suitable research to support your assumptions? What are your assumptions on the topic, anyway? You haven’t read anything. Camp in the library for two consecutive weeks and exhaust the subject matter by reading as many peer-reviewed journals as you can. Nobody is pushing you from behind to do these things, nobody is there to hold your hand while you do all the things you were doing in high school, too, but always assisted by a teacher. It all depends on you. No pressure there.
Throughout eight months of higher education, I've acquired a great load of information, working and time management skills that any employer secretly desires in their ideal employee, and an impressive gallery of studying selfies.
(personal archive)
4) Self-confidence makes you look smarter.
If university has made me doubt my intellect quite a bit, it hasn’t really changed my approach to self-confidence: I’ve never had it, and I will probably never fully achieve it. One thing that I do know now, though, is that self-confidence is a key asset anywhere in life, and in university too. If you act like you know your stuff and you are totally in control of the situation (even when, in fact, life is falling apart and you can’t bring yourself to write a few damn flash cards), chances are that you’ll make it, and perform better than if you panic and start believing you are the dumbest individual to ever walk the campus of your uni. I found that channelling self-confidence when it comes to organising and delivering an oral presentation can make the difference between an upper second class and a first class. Soon enough, I ended up enjoying one of the academic tasks I’ve dreaded the most throughout secondary school and high school alike. Self-confidence will certainly not save you if you did poor research and talk gibberish about a topic you know nothing about, but if you actually have great information on your hands and zero optimism about what’s going to come, it might be the answer that you need. So go on, walk in that classroom like you own the place and try not to turn around at the PowerPoint slides.
5) Opportunities are limitless if you end up in the right place.
Coming to university has made me feel very happy and hopeful about the future, but also fearful and quite discouraged. In fact, I was a first year student coming from a foreign country, struck by cultural shock and pretty sure no-one cared about what I had to say. I was shortly swept off my feet: I woke up surrounded by students and teachers of all ages and cultures, and chances of stepping out and making a name for myself despite my own young age and modest origins. University is one crazy place with opportunities for everybody, and as somebody who is quite hard-working and infinitely dedicated to what I believe in, I soon found myself at home. My satisfaction with my choice for higher education went through the roof, and I ended up learning so much about involvement and motivation. Opportunities are simply everywhere, doors are open for you to come and try new things, discover what you want to do in life and do your best in that particular field. So yeah, go and seize them. I am trying to do that myself.
Fun fact: when exam season comes, the floor is the only seating option left in the Lanchester Library.
(personal archive)
6) University is a sad metaphor for adult life.
Why ‘sad’, you might wonder? Well, university is pretty much your debut as an adult. A young one who might not be that great at cooking and almost crapped themselves when they realised they had to open a bank account on their own, but an adult nevertheless. University consists of a bundle of experiences and situations that are actually rites of passages initiating you into adulthood and all its challenges: living away from home, managing your own budget, preparing professionally for your future career. All these things are exciting and dramatic, but also disheartening: you are turning your back to childhood, early youth and the times when everything was easy and you could always rely on a grown up when things went wrong. Everything starts to be stressful, and you realise that, despite having friends, a partner and neighbours, you are mostly on your own, and in full responsibility. Everything that you experience throughout your uni years is a small-sized version of the plot twists of adulthood, starting with not having enough money to do everything you want and ending with loud dorm neighbours who scream at each other at 2 AM. As for myself, I haven’t gone through anything that problematic just yet (and God help me I won’t), but I know one thing for sure: I’ve grown up, and there is no turning back.
Typing in the last sentence of point 6) has left me sadder than I expected. Chin up, I’m where I’ve always wanted to be, living the dream, so why so gloomy? Now more than ever, at the end of my first year of university, nostalgia and the desire to reflect are overcoming me. I won’t bother saying to those of you who are still in school, enjoy these carefree years as long as you can, because I know you won’t agree. Me, for one, I haven’t. Uni is pretty cool, don’t get me wrong. Doing laundry is kind of a drag, though.
Photo source: personal archive.
Photo edit: InstaSize.