Semester 1, 2020
I sat in the AUSAID lecture theatre, fighting every urge- to not fall asleep to the monotonous drone of my course coordinator. Despite my best efforts, I felt my eyelids drooping- plus the humidity wasn’t helping at all. Although the large ceiling fans swung by every five seconds to blast cool air in my direction, it did little to keep the island heat at bay. Internally, I prayed the professor wouldn’t call me out for sleeping in his class in front of so many students. I shook my head, trying to focus, and looked around to see if anyone had the same problem. The uninterested ones seemed to scroll on their phones or listen to music. I sighed. This would not work. My revision tactics that worked in high school seemed futile at university, and to add to my misery, this was my second year and I still felt so out of place.
I decided that was the last time I ever would attend any lecture face to face. I would rather watch lecture recordings at 150x speed than go through another torturous session like this one. Now… I know what you’re thinking: “most students can’t commit to watching lecture recordings. It's like saving posts on Instagram to look at later, but guess what, later never comes”. I understand the trajectory you’re heading towards, mate. I had also understood the implications of heading down this path. If I was to win, I had to trick my brain into working productively in my home environment, through the power of habit and self-discipline. Which, looking back now, worked to a certain extent and was enough to get me through university. This brings me to the present. Here I am, finished and yet feeling like the biggest fraud ever. Feeling like I still haven’t learnt a thing. The reason…not so simple.
Teaching myself Deep Learning Over the years, I have been teaching myself to be a deep learner. My focus has always been to be a critical thinker. I think it’s an ideal that everyone should strive towards. To refuse to accept anything at face value and to venture beyond the surface. Probably the closest I got to deep learning was in secondary school. I remember how we used to master concepts, going to the very roots of the syllabus. Allow me to explain;
In high school, there were 3 main exams within a school year. First-Term, Mid-Term and then Final exams. So that meant we had 3 chances to master a concept, 3 chances to fully understand what we were learning. The concepts (not necessarily the same questions) deemed incorrect in first term exams, you could reattempt in midterm and final exams. That was to some extent boring (if you easily grasped the curriculum) but at uni-level, it was another extreme altogether. Boy, O boy was I in for a surprise.
Here is the surprise in one sentence:
What we learnt for one term in high school was only a week’s syllabi at uni.
Yes, let that sink in.
When Realization Hit I concluded that in order to succeed at uni, (and by success I mean doing just enough to pass the courses- don’t judge me), it was important to realize that there were literally nooooo second chances. When you took a unit for a semester, you had to understand that a particular concept was tested only once, maybe twice, if you did the exercise in tutorials and it was tested for short tests or final exams. But then that was it. There was no in-depth exploration. Why? Simply put, there was not enough time. That unit which had the syllabus of the entire year had to be completed within 3–4 months. And yet, no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t seem to adjust to this transition.
I felt like an imposter because I knew I had not explored a particular topic to its depths. And yet to the system, it was enough?
Survival of the Fittest — How I Hung on for Dear Life I had programmed myself for deep learning but there was no way I could do this without being severely burnt out (which at the end of second year I was- shocker). The only plausible explanation for my burnout is, I was going from one extreme to another -from a deeply stringent systematic timetable to a highly intense and spontaneous schedule. By my third year, I was hanging by a thread and did not care to do anything except the bare minimum. I realized that this was not learning. Truth be told, I don’t think anyone is going to be a deep learner in this way. To some people, this might not even be a big deal. That I am blowing matters out of proportion, but I grew up with a lot of faith in the education system and devoted my entire being to it. To me, it was the essence of truth. I later found out in some instances it was quite the opposite.
Now that you have my perspective, you might understand why extremely established people like Elon Musk say that “they don’t really care much about a college degree”. But that’s a story for another day ;)
Let's put in some balance, shall we? Let's face it. It would be irresponsible on my part to discredit the entire university experience. There were many other areas in which I have grown.
For instance, time management. Time management is literally everything. You want to survive, manage your time. Effectively. Doing the most in the least amount of time necessary. That was my rule which prevented me from procrastinating my assignments. I had to make it look easy. The only reason we procrastinate work is that in our mind it's this daunting task that must be perfect. So we put it off. I had to force myself to stop thinking this way or I would get nothing done and leave everything for the last minute and then regret my entire existence. So, the moral of the story through many trials and errors is to make the task seem easy, like wearing shoes or combing your hair. Also, sometimes you just have to start. Don’t think too much about it. You can do improvements along the way. Nobody is perfect, so stop being such a perfectionist.
Second, exposure. Oh man. Getting out of my shell was so difficult and yet so necessary. I definitely feel so much more independent after my university experience. A lot of my perceptions have shifted or led to a deeper understanding of different worldviews. The person I was in high school is definitely not the same person I am now. Exposure has helped me to understand how to react to different situations or even how to evaluate my own methods and perceptions in response to others in life. So that is something I will always be grateful for.
Ultimately, networking has been a key factor that prevents me from nullifying the whole experience. A university environment is a place to meet like-minded people, to forge relationships through group assignments or study sessions, which may as well lead you on to the work environment. So building that “network over time” is one of the major benefactors of the whole college experience. Some people stay and some people go, and that’s ok. Such is life. But they can all teach you important lessons. So take the lessons and move on your path.
FIGURE 1. Pie chart showing percentages of skills learnt.
Although the college or university educational system has its negative connotations, it is here to stay and, in many cases, is a beacon of hope to many families in Fiji and around the world. My purpose in writing about my experience is to provide an honest opinion of how this system works. To me, a university degree has been a checklist to get off my back. To some, it is the epitome of achievement and success. I am just ok that I got to experience what society’s version of “success” was. Through the grace of God, I was able to complete it without completely shattering under its pressure. There are still many behaviours to undo, things to relearn, and problems to solve for the betterment of society. This has and always been my goal.
University was just a stepping stone.
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