Bon's Mots

It has been a month since I’ve com­pleted my classes. I am cur­rently in­tern­ing at the Ontario Dental Association and love it. The stress and doubt that has plagued me for the last seven months is dis­si­pat­ing. I am slowly re­turn­ing to my old self.

I reread my very first blog post last night. It’s hard to be­lieve that eight months ago I walked on the cam­pus for the first time, an­tic­i­pat­ing how my life would un­furl with a mix­ture of ex­cite­ment and dread. I think enough time has lapsed for me to look back, re­flect and come up with some ad­vice for other ma­ture stu­dents re­turn­ing to school af­ter a long ab­sence from academia.

Treat school like a job

Arrive on time, at­tend all classes and meet your dead­lines. You will strengthen your per­sonal brand with the fac­ulty and stu­dents and be viewed as some­one who is pro­fes­sional, cour­te­ous and de­pend­able. It will also help you adapt on a men­tal and emo­tional level. You are leav­ing a life of rou­tine and free evenings and week­ends for one that will be er­ratic and de­mand­ing. It will be a hard tran­si­tion to make.

Structure your days so that you have some time to your­self in the evenings and week­ends. I know it’s eas­ier said than done, but even the slight­est ef­fort brings some re­ward. If your days end early, stay on cam­pus and do some work un­til the end of the day — up­date your re­sume, write a blog post, search for jobs. Because com­ing home at 2 p.m. while your friends are at work dri­ves home the fact that you are not work­ing. It was in June that I be­gan jonesing for a job, a rou­tine, a 9-to-5 work week. Watching Oprah at home every af­ter­noon did not seem right. (Watching Oprah should never seem right, but you get my drift.)

Don’t fuss the grades

When you are in in­ter­views for an in­tern­ship or a job, you will not be asked what grades you re­ceived. Don’t be a keener like me and strive for As. As the pro­gram went on I quickly re­al­ized it was an ex­er­cise in fu­til­ity. You are there to learn — no one ex­pects you to write the per­fect es­say or the most per­sua­sive news re­lease on the first at­tempt. Furthermore, you have too many as­sign­ments to com­plete in a very lim­ited time­frame. As long as you do your best, hand in your work on time and learn from your mis­takes, your ef­forts will be rec­og­nized. If you reach for any­thing be­yond that, you’ll wear your­self thin. 

Dramarama

Take one high school-like set­ting. Mix in 28 peo­ple of vary­ing back­grounds. Stir in some ten­sion. Add a dash of stress. Stew for seven months. That’s a recipe for drama (or an in­ter­est­ing re­al­ity tele­vi­sion show). You might get caught up in it. You may cre­ate some of your own.

Avoid it. Do not get wrapped up in petty con­flicts. If it doesn’t con­cern or af­fect you in any way, leave it alone, as my fa­ther would say. You have your own prob­lems to deal with — why do you need to take on some­one else’s? Going back to my first point, if you treat school like a job, treat your class­mates like co-workers. You can still be so­cial, pleas­ant and friendly. But keep the drama where it be­longs — on television.

You are back at school for one pur­pose — learn­ing, get­ting a cer­tifi­cate and ul­ti­mately es­tab­lish­ing a new ca­reer. Don’t treat this as an op­por­tu­nity to live your high school years over again. Don’t let any­thing dis­tract you from why you’re there. If you forge some friend­ships at the end of it, think of it as an added bonus.

So, that’s it. I’ll end this post with the words of the great 20^th cen­tury bard, Casey Kasem: “Keep your feet on the ground and keep reach­ing for the stars.”