Hassam Munir | Executive Editor (Online)
Featured illustration by Jasmine Wiradharma
York gives it to you straight as soon as you get here — this is your time. This is your time to waste away, or your time to have the most productive and experience-rich years of your life.
Experience is the key word. They say there was a time when you could go to college or university and come out at the other end, four years later, with the job you always wanted. That is definitely no longer the case. Nowadays, just about any list of qualifications for a job asks you for experience, not just a degree. They don’t want to know about your program. They want to know what you’ve been through and what you learned from it.
To remain competitive in this kind of market, making the best of your time in university is key. In my years at York, I have witnessed students squandering far too much time, effort and often money on meaningless experiences without gaining anything. Yet they insist on trying again and again. Casually dropping in and out of empty relationships, drinking away during exam season and leaving Toronto to go vacationing in another near-identical concrete jungle are a few examples I’ve encountered.
Of course, every new experience is a risk that you take, and as skeptical as I may be, drinking through exam season may or may not actually work for some students. So it’s not so much the risks that students take that I find disturbing, it’s the risks that they don’t take. It’s important to realize that there probably won’t be a better time in your life to try stepping out of your comfort zone than now. York is a land of opportunities for those who are willing to step up and take them.
Try a course that interests you in a field that is completely unrelated to your major. Join a varsity sports team or take part in college intramurals. Head over to York Lanes and and try food from different cultures. Take some time to explore the library and find books to read on subjects that interest you. Develop your skills such as debating and public speaking by joining different clubs. Learn about the social justice issues that student activists on campus are fighting for. Try to suggest your own essay topic to your professor instead of choosing from the list given to you.
And while you’re at it, visit Excalibur’s office in the Student Centre to learn how you can contribute to your community newspaper.
The point is to gain diverse experience. Make it a habit to try something new and think of what you can learn from it. I could sum this up by encouraging you to use your time wisely, but I won’t, because it’s difficult to foresee the wisdom in something. But do use your time. Because this is your time. It’s running out and you’ll never get it back once it’s gone.
