… by Jaden / from CA, United States / BSc Mathematics / 1st Year (UG)
You just got back from football practice. Maybe you’ve been playing for a year or almost your entire life. Nonetheless, you love it and that’s what’s important. Regardless of what passions you have, or if you want to discover new ones, it’s natural to have worries about balancing life with studying. In fact, it’s natural to have a bit (or a lot) of anxiety about University in general! However, despite the anxiety you may have, it’s important to know that there’s time for both in University if you play your cards right.
This may come off as obvious, but time management is the key to maintaining a healthy balance between University work and extracurricular activities. Things like building up a routine and using a written or digital planner are key to maintaining balance. It may take some time to adjust, but you’ll eventually learn how to best build your work habit. The maths programme is mostly based on a self-study system, so while you may have lectures and tutorials scheduled for you, how and when you learn is mostly up to you. So building a schedule that balances your studies, compulsory classes, and your extracurricular activity events is relatively malleable and can be done in an orderly fashion when you use your time efficiently.
What’s important to know is that it’s possible to get involved in University extracurricular activities comfortably no matter your schedule – in fact, I would argue that it’s a crucial addition to any University student’s schedule. Luckily, the University has many societies, clubs, etc… to get involved in. With over 200 societies on campus, there’s a wide variety of activities to get involved in no matter what your interests are.
At University, I spend most of my time on coursework, dance, and with friends. Along with maths, I enjoy spending my additional time on campus dancing. Though I personally am part of the ballroom dance society as well as the salsa society, there are of course more dance and non-dance societies which you can join. Of course, societies are revolved around their designated purpose, but there are of definitely social benefits to partaking in them as well. Societies are a great way to meet people from all across the University as it’s composed of students from various degrees, studying different years, plus there is a mix of both undergraduate and postgraduate students. Societies are also an important part of our own well-being. University can get stressful at times, and being able to step away from work and take a moment for ourselves is an important aspect for daily life. And of course it is an opportunity for self discovery, finding and filling our lives with new passions.
University is the time we get to choose how our lives look, and life is much more than education which is found in the classroom. So I encourage everyone to find new things to look forward to so you can wake up in the morning feeling excited for your day to come!