A Note To students

Summer is officially over. It is back to school week and it’s raining in Vancouver. The seasons seem to cycle faster every year, don’t you think?

Students, I envy you.

This is my 20th year as a university professor, and as much as I love my career as a teacher/practitioner, there’s a part of me that would rather be where you are. I’ve often said that if I could redo any portion of my life, it would be my years as a university undergraduate.

Back then, I really struggled with my eating disorder and intense anxiety. Obsessed with maintaining a high GPA (and a very low weight), I steered clear of courses I thought would be too hard for me to get A’s in, even if I thought they might be interesting. I wonder sometimes where I’d be and what I’d be doing if I had a different attitude about school, if I trusted myself and my brain to be the student I now know I could be.  Like I said, Psychology was a great choice, but I made that decision after I graduated with a BA in Communications. Someday, perhaps, after I retire, I’ll start all over and take a different path - maybe science, maybe art, who knows?

If I can offer you any words of advice from my experience as both student and teacher, I’d say, take your job seriously, but not to the extent that you’re in a constant state of panic. Take the time to read and write; don’t wait until the night before to write that paper or cram for that exam. Don’t plagiarize or cheat on your tests; you may get a good grade, but you won’t feel good about yourself. Ask questions in class and see your profs during office hours. Most importantly, I hope you find joy in the process of learning, and that you maximize your opportunities for personal and pre-professional growth. It doesn't matter if you never have the occasion to use that formula you memorized for statistics, or if anyone else reads the paper you wrote on significant works of Renaissance sculptors -- you're exercising your mental muscles and developing thinking skills that will, hopefully, serve you well in your days ahead.

Have a great semester –

Ellen
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