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Mistakes I Made in College

 I can't believe that today is the last day of classes and my first year of college is coming to an end. The school year was pretty eventful and there were many firsts in my life: first time traveling to NYC alone, first time attending BSO, first time trying a cannoli, etc. I am glad that I was very serious about ticking off as many of the items on the 101 Things to Do Before Graduation list that I received during orientation, though I still have some regrets. 

My first regret is that last semester I got the BSO college card (MIT students pay $5 for the ENTIRE season) but I had issues with the website. The website interface kind of sucks and they don't recognize that you are a college cardholder until you log out and then log in. I gave up going to BSO since I couldn't figure out what the problem was until I attempted again during February and went to as many concerts ever since. Because I didn't go to BSO last semester, I missed out on a lot of performances that were practically free. Thinking about that makes me want to curse loudly. I find it sad that I wasted my time going to parties just because I had FOMO and not because I really liked dancing or the loud noise. I don't mean that parties are a waste of time. They are just not really for me since I don't like how late they start and how they mess up my sleep schedule. 

My other regret is that I wanted to go to a lot of special guest lectures and talks, but I always ended up not going because of a problem set, midterm, or club commitment. I feel like I am not making the best use of the resources that MIT provides me with and I will not have access to so many wonderful opportunities once I graduate. I mean, when will I get to hear an executive from Moderna talk about vaccines again? When will I get to meet cool authors another time? 

To not make this mistake again, I will probably have to be a lot more efficient and finish my work 2-3 days before it is due so I can make time to go to one special event each month. 

Speaking of the resources at MIT, I am also sad that I wasn't aware of the abundant academic resources until a few weeks before the end of spring semester. Differential equations became a nightmare after spring break and I would only go to a couple of office hours that didn't offer that much personalized help. They were helpful, but not as much compared to say the math learning center. I was so mad to realize that I forgot about the math learning center until the end of April. The math learning center is underutilized and when I went there, there was literally no one else or at most one other person. By going there, I got to get work done a lot more quickly and get more one-on-one help. I also am kind of bothered that I didn't consider going to TSR^2 (Talented Scholars Resource Room) even though I pass by that room quite often. I was surprised to learn after taking Biochemistry that they offered help for that class. 

To not make myself feel so sad, I am glad that I used the Writing and Communication Center for my memoir class last semester. Not only did I get a lot of constructive feedback from the writing appointments, but also it made me accountable and forced me to finish things relatively early. 

In the future, I will consider trying TSR^2 for Organic Chemistry II. If I take linear algebra, I will go to the math learning center and TSR^2 because I heard that class is hard. 

The main takeaway is that a lot of my regrets come from not making the best use of the opportunities that my college offered. If there are free things or discounts, use them. If there are resources, use them. College tuition is pretty expensive so you ideally want to maximize your experience. 

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