Four years ago I joined engineering. 1500 days have passed by from that day and here I am, with a B.E degree and a lot of questions to ask myself. What have I learnt? Was it worth it? Go ahead, ask yourselves too.
Gone are the days when holding an engineering degree was something to be proud of but not anymore. For those of you who got into an engineering college, like I did, I’m sure things are never going to be the same again. This post is all about my experience of what happens inside a college. About what people think you do in college and what you actually do. Three words – You Grow. Expand. Explode.
Choosing a college to do your degree is like choosing a dish from a menu in a restaurant, there are 100 of them to choose from. You’ll get to know how a particular food item tastes only after you have eaten it. Same way in a college, only after spending nearly 3-4 years of lost time will you realize that you are a “Jack of all trades, master of none”.
After you enroll into a college, that welcome speech you get is just the tip of the iceberg. You just don’t realize that all they convey is Half-truth and a whole lot of lies. The one that caught my eye was an advertisement that my college had given on a newspaper. It was a half page ad that listed all the companies that would visit my college campus to hire students. As usual the list boasted of the top-tier Indian MNCs like Infosys, Tcs, Accenture and many more. What was surprising was the mentioning of the name “Microsoft” in that list. Back then, I had no idea how the campus placements would work but, the build-up these colleges give you, would definitely make you think that you would end up joining one of those companies or the other. The way these people do marketing, it was as if Bill Gates himself would come down and conduct the interviews personally.
It just took me 4 years to realize that all of these were part of a prank that the colleges are successfully playing on each and every student. In most of the colleges, students only do not attend regularly, how can one expect an MNC or just any other company to visit them? Although in my college I’ve seen snakes visiting the campus more often than certain students did. 😛
How time flies! You’ll be surprised to know that you’re already in the 2nd year of degree by the time you write a couple a tests and a dozen exams. Among those tests and exams I can guarantee, not even one of them would be helpful for what you would be doing in the future. I seriously don’t understand why a Computer Science student has to do Chemistry experiments for 6 months when he/she is pretty sure he/she is not going to end up working with Ethanol and Methanol. An entire year is wasted by forcing students to study subjects that are way out of their field of interests. Do you really think it is worth any student’s time, spending 6 months studying the Indian Constitution for a 50 mark multiple choice exam? I certainly don’t think so and I’d be willing to debate on it if you don’t agree with me. Wouldn’t it be beneficial for the students if they are given hands on experience of what they’re going to work on after college, instead of revising the formula for a titration?
Another dozen of exams and you’re already a senior! Just when you thought the subjects were enough to blow your mind, you come across people. You bond with some of them and bitch about the others. This goes on until one day you become aware that you are all for yourself. You gently let go of things not meant for you and “Grow” as a person. In the meanwhile, with the number of friends you have at college and the amount of time you spend with them, you’re sure to visit those canteens and nearby bakeries quite often. That is when you “Expand”. Putting on weight, I meant. 😀
Then, all hell breaks loose. It suddenly strikes you that you’ve spent more time in this college than some of the lecturers have. The unfortunate species, like me and a whole lot of you, find ourselves standing in queues at another college with students of some other college, trying to get an opportunity to write a test just so that you can attend an interview for a job that we have all been longing for. The odds are never in your favor when you’re not a master of what you’ve learnt and when you are just one among the 1000 students who are staring back at you, which ever direction you look. The 1st time you fail to clear the test, you console yourself saying that you would crack it the next time. The 2nd time you fail, you think of what mistakes you did. 3rd, 4th, 5th,….. 10th time instead of writing the test, you start thinking where it all went wrong, what you could have possibly done to have avoided being in this situation. Where ever you go, you’re missing out some way or the other. At one point in time, you “Explode”. It happens such that you’re made to feel that all those things that you’ve believed in are proven wrong. You feel like staring at black hole trying to suck you in. I have been there and done all of that. This is what is happening to students. A mental trauma that they cannot explain, a psychological stress that they’re not able to overcome and many more.
4 years on, this is what I have learnt. To make peace with what you are given, to make the best use of all those things that you have. I have learnt that one should not let their past affect their present / what they are doing now. Because what you are doing now, is what shapes your future. When you give your best, to each moment you spend in doing what ever that is you’re doing, I’m pretty sure the outcome would be much better and highly satisfying. In the end, it all depends on what you choose to believe.
More to come. Keep watching this space 🙂
My blog: anjanbaradwaj.wordpress.com
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