I started my journey at the University of Calgary in September 2016 and graduated five years later in November 2021. It was an adventure filled with many long days, exciting projects, frustrations, and successes!
I'm writing to reflect upon the important lessons that I learned over these five years. My goal is to retain these lessons myself, as well as share them with others that may wish to know more about the university experience.
As I started writing this blog post, I realized the breadth of experiences that most students (including myself) go through during university. There is so much to discuss that I've decided to write a series of blog posts, which you'll see on this blog over the next several months.
In this post, I wanted to start from the beginning: first year university!
In my first year, I began in common core engineering. Coming into university, I didn't know what it would be like. I knew for sure that it would be a lot of work and that I wanted to continue to be involved in community service activities while in university.
There were several key experiences I had in first year:
- Moving to a new city (Saskatoon → Calgary) and living on my own for the first time in first year residence.
- Attending orientation week to learn about university, engineering, and activities on campus
- 10 courses over two semesters (the standard course load), and 50-80 hours of academic work per week including classes, assignments, projects, and exams
- Community service and extracurricular activities: 8-12 hours each week between five different organizations
- Learning more about different disciplines and areas of study, both within and outside of engineering
- Leadership development programs
- Mentorship from upper year students through various mentorship programs on campus
So, what did I learn in first year? Well, I certainly gained a lot of technical knowledge, some of which I still use today. But I want to focus on the life lessons I learned:
- Hard work is important
- Find your balance
- Re-evaluate and re-prioritize often
- It is best to be your own biggest supporter - and critic
- In retrospect, consider decisions based on the information you had at the time
Hard work is important
To be fair, I knew that hard work was important coming into university, but first year proved to me just how valuable it was. I set two primary goals: to earn a high GPA and to become involved in community service organizations. To achieve these goals, my daily routine (including on weekends) consisted of 8 to 14 hours of academics (classes, tutorials, studying, assignments, projects, etc.) and an additional 1 to 4 hours volunteering. My focus and work ethic allowed me to meet both of my goals and proved to me the importance of hard work.
Find your balance
I focused heavily on academics and extracurriculars in my first year. I also ensured I ate relatively healthy meals and had a healthy amount of sleep. However, in the first semester, I hardly exercised, and this resulted in lowered productivity until I decided to prioritize fitness and maintain better balance. This demonstrated to me the importance of balance.
Everyone has a different balance that works for them. I'm highly motivated to achieve my goals, so balance for me is maintaining healthy habits (for example, healthy eating, fitness, and sleep) while focusing on different goals.
Re-evaluate and re-prioritize often
It is important to recognize trade-offs between time, effort, and rewards, and make decisions based on those trade-offs. In retrospect, I spent too much time on academics in first year university (sometimes up to 80 hours per week!) and should have spent more time on other activities such as staying active, meeting other people, and completing personal design projects. While I didn't know at the beginning of first year how much effort would be required to achieve my goals and my initial approach (and time allocation) was appropriate, I should have re-evaluated my progress towards my goals and adapted my approach (and did this much better in second year!).
It is best to be your own biggest supporter - and critic
There is only one person in the world that understands everything occurring in your life - you! We have 24 hours a day of lived experiences, so it would be impossible for anyone else to understand every aspect of your life. As a result, you have to be your own biggest champion and supporter. Similarly, you should also ideally be the person who knows your weaknesses best, and work toward addressing those weaknesses.
In retrospect, consider decisions based on the information you had at the time
In retrospect, I wish I had spent more time staying active, socializing, and completing extracurricular technical development in first year. I had set goals for myself and spent much more time than necessary to achieve my academic goals. That time could have been better spent elsewhere. But it is easy to retrospectively criticize ourselves based on what we know now. Instead, we should assess decisions based on information we had at the time.
In my first year, I had very little context about how I would perform in university. I also didn't have an effective way to get that information without actually starting university! Based on the information I had at the time, focusing on academics and extracurriculars was the right decision. My goals were important to me, so I did my best to meet them, even if it meant putting aside other pursuits. It's easy to be hard on yourself, but if I were to go back, I would make the same decisions at the start of first year, just re-evaluate and re-prioritize earlier.
Conclusion
I hope this post provided some insight into my experiences in first year university, and some of the lessons I learned. I look forward to discussing my second year experiences and lessons learned next!
