Dear fresher,
Welcome to the next stage of your life, where you’re expected to mature like a fine wine, retain knowledge like a sponge and find the perfect balance between your social life and your academics. University, for most, is the last stage of their education; after years of exams leading up to this moment, you’ve finally made it! Give yourself a high five – you deserve it. As a third-year student myself, I feel I have some pearls of knowledge to pass on to fellow students, things I have learnt up till now which might be helpful, some UOM insight which might be of some use.
If there is one thing I can be certain of, it is that throughout your years to come at the University of Malta, one day or another your lectures will be cancelled. They will be cancelled abruptly, just like your plans on a Friday night when you’ve just about finished drawing on your brows and your friend cancels at the very last minute. As you arrive at University convinced that you will have to park miles away, in the distance, almost a mirage appears…parking in car park 6. That rare happiness you can’t help but feel, the kind you mention at least every hour – “I found parking right outside guys!” – the kind of parking which you gladly gloat about on your Snapchat story.
As you leave your car, smiling and with a hop in our step, your phone rings. No, it’s not your mom wishing you a great day or Facebook reminding you whose birthday it is, it’s your UOM e-mail: ‘Dear student, today’s lecture commencing at 8 a.m. is cancelled and will be postposed to a later date.’ I look down at my watch, it’s 7:40 a.m. – that’s right, waking up at 6 a.m., skipping breakfast and wasting half a tank of petrol in traffic all for nothing. You drag your feet back to your car; it doesn’t even matter where you parked at this point, its actually irrelevant. Back to bed.
This is your home for the next three to five years; most hours of the week will be spent at University, and you might as well create a pleasant environment. Apart from lectures and tutorials, University has a lot more to offer, you can join a student organisation where you have the opportunity to get directly involved and also meet new people, after all, it’s time to expand your horizons. Joining an organisation should not be seen as taxing, but rather as a platform to expressing yourself and your interests, to become that beautiful flower at the peak of spring.
Fresher, you can also take part in the yearly KSU Student’s Fest, which is a true testament of the students creativity and their dedication to the production; whether you can dance, sing, act, help out with props or even if you just like to run around in the dark wearing a black top and trousers or perhaps carrying a table or some other prop, there is surely a place for you.
READING. Dear fresher, if there is one thing that you can do for yourself is to read. Remember, knowledge is power and power is EVERYTHING…okay, maybe not everything. Read as much as you can as, in all honestly, it will only help you and you will reap the rewards long after you finish your degree. You can watch that episode of ‘Game of Thrones’ another day, catch up on your reading and be prepared for your lecture, because before you know it, it’s January and exams are round the corner. I learnt this the hard way, I failed to keep with a few of my lectures and as repercussion I had to re-sit some of my subjects in the hot summer months whilst my friends were at the beach. It’s not worth the stress, do yourself a favour and try to be organised with your subjects – you’ll thank yourself for it soon enough.
Treasure the next few years at university. Student life is the best life – work hard and find that balance between Friday nights out and early Monday mornings. Get involved at University, for, soon enough, you’ll graduate and you will not remember all the lectures you attended and all the assignments you lost sleep on, but one thing you will remember, as cliché as it sounds, are the memoires you made and the friends along the way…
WELCOME TO UOM.
