I’ve got some shocking news: askastudent is not the only person on campus with useful information and awesome opinions. I know, it sounds crazy, but sometimes it’s good to hear what other people have to say. aska top 5’s is a regular feature that lets a diverse lineup of interesting UofT folk share some of their tips, which might range from incredibly practical to incredibly disturbing. this time on aska: Josef Szende.
1. Read the anti-Calendar to find out which courses are the best.
Don’t do courses because you have to do them, do them because you want
to do them. Pick courses first subject POSts second. Make your subject
POSts fit what you want to do, not the other way around.
2. Stay in residence and join course unions – the first and second
best ways to make friends. If you have friends and are looking for
things to do, check out NOW and Eye free newspapers that tell you
everything going on in Toronto. Also, the Thursday Toronto Star has
the “What’s On” section and The Globe and Mail (available at Rotman
for free) has a good movie guide.
3. Don’t get a job while studying full time – life will be hell, marks
will suffer, and happiness will be non-existant. Obviously, work if
you must, but if that’s the case, strongly consider taking a smaller
course load. Or try and work at well-paying job in the summer to carry
you through the year.
4. Find a scholarship to win and go get it; at the beginning of the
year pick a scholarship that you think you would be eligible for and
do some stuff to qualify yourself for it. This is a much more fun way
to earn 1,000 to 5,000 dollars than a job, plus it looks good on your
resume. To do this you’ll need to get involved in something. There are
many, many opportunities to get involved in student politics: your
college, faculty, SAC, governing council. There are also dozens of
charitable, development oriented societies and student publications.
Notably, Hart House is a world of student involvement unto itself. If
only you had the time, you could live very well off the Hart House
bounty.
5. Do the reading. At UK universities, people don’t ask you what you
study, they say, “what do you read?” Your university education is
basically the combination of many years reading, especially if you are
an arts student (and thanks to distribution credits, we all take at
least 1 credit out of 20 in humanities!) If you don’t like reading,
learn to like it because that’s what university is all about! If you
don’t like reading in your room (I never did), explore the St. George
campus’ 26 libraries.
here’s why you should listen to Josef Szende: in addition to being able to row long distances, eat food in shockingly large amounts, and sleep anywhere at any time, the different countries he’s visited outnumber bad Nicholas Cage and Sylvester Stallone films combined. and there’s also the high marks. if any of you ever bump into this character (currently in Europe), treat him well: he could very well be a future president of UofT, in which case i want my transcipt changed, y’hear?