The (proper) education of the youth is one of those timeless topics that are equally fit for discussion in the finer lounges as well as at the dinner table. Allow me to chime in with my own most significant take-aways for how to make the most out of your time invested in university.
University is not nearly as much about knowledge as it is about networking, as I wrote about in What is the purpose of university? While all knowledge can be found in books and on Wikipedia, which are equally accessible for non-students, it is synthesized within a “forum.” This is thus the most important aspect of higher education. But who to target and how to establish great contacts?
Go the extra mile in interesting courses.
Most ambitious students who feel they have the capacity to squeeze in more hours per week choose to either get a part-time job or participate in more courses. I know many students studying at 150-200% of full-time pace. While this is impressive, putting all that extra energy into one or two interesting courses can result in some very useful consequences.
First of all, you get a chance to actually establish a relationship with a teacher. The lack of personal interaction with teachers is a serious flaw in today’s education system. I would be surprised if more than three teachers know an arbitrary student’s name. But through making the most out of an interesting course you will undoubtedly get noticed and be remembered for being ambitious and interested. This is far more useful than an extra course in your transcript.
Secondly, you get a different kind of intellectual satisfaction when aiming for quality studies as opposed to quantity studies. I’m not saying specialization is to be preferred over diversity, but it is an alternative worth pursuing.
Get noticed by your fellow students, and notice them too.
While getting to know teachers is very useful, I’d say that fellow students should have equal priority for being included in your network. For well-educated people the market is very small; you will stumble upon your class mates in every corner of the world later in life. Take every chance to show ambition and competence towards students as towards teachers.
It’s simple, really. Join different people when doing projects. There is no better way of getting to know people than to work with them; it’s the one way of establishing life-long contacts, both professionally and privately.
Make great presentations. Don’t just throw together the reports — write well and relevant. Answer the teachers’ questions at the lectures. Use new tools, and always share your knowledge with enthusiasm. And while doing this, make sure to notice the other students who show interest and involvement. Those are probably the ones you want to get to know.
Lastly, while university is a major investment and an important step in one’s career, you will want to relax and just enjoy the ride. The overly serious student almost certainly fails to discover that knowledge is all about new toys for the brain to play with.
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December 30th, 2009
by Erik Frisk
It’s very true that university is about building a network, even though I think few people realize it before it’s too late.
I would also mention the value of extracurricular activities (societies, clubs, student-run companies, etc.). In my experience that’s where you build the deepest relationships.
December 30th, 2009
by Emanuel
The Author
Extracurriculars are without a doubt invaluable! But they deserve their own blog post :) I realized afterwards that a mention in the post perhaps should have been appropriate.