The one piece of advice that I constantly received in high school from friends and teachers was to get involved in extracurricular activities.
Even when I said that I wasn’t interested in any of the clubs at my high school, I was always told that it’s better to get involved in something since it’ll look good on my resume and university applications. I eventually gave in and half-heartedly became a small part of a few clubs.
And by small part I mean I signed up and then never showed up for anything again.
But things changed when I got to university. I started seeing a plethora of club advertisements all over campus.
No matter what you were interested in, there was literally something for everyone. When one of my close friends introduced me to The Cord in second year, I was immediately hooked.
Not only were they looking for writers, they were looking for sports writers. As an obsessive sports fan, sports writing is all I’ve ever wanted to do and when I finally started volunteering for The Cord, I was like a kid in a candy shop. I was doing something that I genuinely enjoyed and, for once, getting involved actually felt like it was worth it.
I am now going into my fourth and final year of university and looking back, becoming a part of The Cord was one of the best decisions I made during my time at Laurier. Not only did I end up meeting some great people, but by working my way up from a volunteer to sports editor, I developed a precise vision for what my career path should be after graduation.
I used to roll my eyes every time someone would tell me to join a club in high school. But after spending three years in university doing something I love, I can confidently say that the shoe is now on the other foot.
I now realize that getting involved is about awareness and effort more than anything else. In hindsight, I probably could have found a club that interested me in high school; I just didn’t look hard enough. And if I really couldn’t find anything that interested me, I could have just created something that did. Â
I’m certain that there are people at Laurier who are capable of writing better sports stories than me. However, they either didn’t know about this opportunity, or they simply didn’t want to put in the work.
I understand that joining or creating clubs might seem like unnecessary added stress for the average university student. Balancing academics, a social life and extracurricular activities could be intimidating at first.
But the way I look at it, if you truly like what you do outside of class, it will only help you deal with that university stress.
There are tons of opportunities to get involved at Laurier, it’s just a matter of finding what works best for you.
I used to roll my eyes every time someone would tell me to join a club in high school. But after spending three years in university doing something I love, I can confidently say that the shoe is now on the other foot.
If I could give one piece of advice to an incoming university student, I would tell them to get involved.
Not just because it’s a nice resume booster, but because it’s one of the most important parts of having a memorable university experience.
