Instead of telling you a funny story this week, I’ve decided to impart my wisdom onto the next generation of scholars and share some random pieces of advice for anyone entering undergraduate or graduate study. I’m sure whoever you impart my wisdom onto will roll their eyes and say ‘ugh, you’ve given me ten study advice books already’ (yes, Stacy, that was directed at you), but you’ll find some of what I have to say is not what you’d expect.
These days K-12 schools are all about college readiness and terrifying 14-year-olds entering high school by telling them “a 4.0 isn’t good enough anymore” (I’m talking about you Mr. Coleman). But instead of worrying about AP classes (a scam, do not waste your time) or your SAT, turn your focus to…word searches. Get really, and I mean really, good at them. Now you’re probably thinking to yourself “but Jenny, I have better things to do with my time than childhood puzzles.” My response to that is: you don’t. Before you dismiss me, a critical skill you will need to succeed in higher education in any field is to be able to quickly find what you’re looking for when researching. I’m talking to you too, little STEM people, this is not just a technique you will need for the humanities. What word searches teach you to do is to be able to look at a block of text and immediately find key words without having to read every line in depth. Not to brag (but also to brag just a little), I can easily look at a page of text in early modern typeface (where ‘s’ looks like ‘f’ and grammar is on another planet) and tell you within a matter of seconds if it has what I’m looking for. It will save you significant amounts of time and energy, so just trust me on this one.
Some of you are not going to like what I’m going to say next, so to put it bluntly, I’m talking about vomit bags. If this displeases you, please feel free to skip to the next paragraph. Okay, now to those of you who have stuck around, my second biggest piece of advice pertains to that pesky side project of keeping yourself alive through your degree. To get to the point, buy vomit bags. And I don’t mean the cheap kind, I mean the type that hospitals have. I just googled “vomit bags” and the exact ones I’m talking about pop up immediately so no excuses. Although I highly recommend every person carry one (it’s not just for you, it could be for the person next to you on a crowded overnight flight), I am specifically speaking to my dining hall friends. Being able to eat whatever you want in a dining hall might sound great, but you need to lower expectations and accept that it’s not ‘if’ you get food poisoning, it’s ‘when’ you get food poisoning. Hence the vomit bags because they save you from stupid decisions like puking in the sink in your room because in your haze you thought that was a good idea and then you have to call a maintenance worker to unclog it since you couldn’t do it yourself (this happened to a friend, totally not me).
Moving on to our ‘cook for yourself’ group of little growing scholars, I promise I have not been paid to write this, but: The Fasta Pasta Maker. If you’re someone who likes to cook and naively believes you will have the time and energy to do so in college, please stop reading now and move on because this only pertains to my realist microwave chefs. Now that we’ve expelled those who will judge us, my lazy cooks, I highly encourage you to purchase this microwave tupperware that I guarantee will change your life. My whole perspective of the world around me was rocked when I discovered the beauty of being able to pour your pasta (fresh or dry, baby) into a container, fill it with the instructed amount of water, then put it in the microwave for 10-15 minutes based on the type of pasta. I swear to god, I and multiple other people who have tried it agree it feels exactly the same as boiling on the stove. Remember, there’s no shame in being of superior intelligence because once you become an owner of The Fasta Pasta maker, you will realize what a colossal waste of time and energy the ‘proper’ way is. We’re not lazy, we’re simply practical geniuses.
Finally, I’m speaking to those you who are moving onto a graduate degree. The best I have to say on that is…accept your fate. Know what you’re getting yourself into and don’t fight it because the truth is that you can’t do it all. All jokes aside, I’m genuinely encouraging you to not pursue a graduate degree in something you do not have a passion, or at least an interest, in. Especially if you are a full time grad student, there are only two outcomes to that mistake: you will fail or you will hate your life. My program alone has lost three students and two of the three decided that they did not love early modern history enough to keep going. To quote one of my professors: “The next twelve months of your life will be hell.” And let me tell you, he was right. Graduate degrees are nothing like the undergraduate experience and unless you are in love with your field or at least the careers the degree will allow you to have, do not do it. Take note that this paragraph does not include jokes because you need to understand the hard truth of graduate study. But if you do love your field, absolutely do it. There has been no greater joy in my life than working through this program. Am I miserable? Of course. Do I love every second, even when I’m on mental breakdown number 4 that week and it’s Tuesday? Yes.
Now that I’ve convinced your parents to buy a word search book for your birthday, encouraged you to not clog sinks, advertised a life changing experience in the kitchen, and scared the shit out of future grad students, I’ll wrap up. Feel free to share my wisdom with your upcoming scholar and force them to read it while they hate you for it.
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