This being summer, the majority of the people who read this issue of the newspaper will be first-year students and I have taken this opportunity to again hammer into their skulls something that they’re probably very tired of hearing: You should get involved in some club or sport during your time here at RPI. I know you (the freshmen) will have heard this over and over again during your SO weekend. I know it will drive you crazy, because it drove me crazy, but I wish I had listened to it more so I could have had a better first semester.
I did not really enjoy my first semester here, and was seriously considering transferring, something I’m sure many of you will also do. I was a member of a couple clubs—on paper—but didn’t really participate much. I had plenty of friends, and had a good time, but it just wasn’t all that great. Second semester was entirely different, though, as I got more involved with this newspaper and my other clubs. It was good to have goals that I was setting for myself, and I started to look forward to more years at RPI. I heard the same from many of my friends, both freshmen and upperclassmen.
One of the most quoted college surveys here is the one that put us right up near the top for unhappiest students. I frequently hear students muttering in classes about how they hate this school, and I bet a lot of upperclassmen have seen the “RPI Sucks” video that was available on the network. But less well known are the two complementary surveys ranking RPI highly for availability of extracurricular activities, and very, very lowly for participation in offered activities. Students here have opporities for extra-curricular activities that are far above-average for American universities, but many do not bother to take advantage of this. Rather than counting themselves lucky or just trying to make the most of their years here, they just sit and brood.
Join a club, play a sport, join a fraternity or sorority, run for student government, join the student newspaper, do something. With cable TV and a high-speed Internet connection right in your dorm room, it’s easy to get stuck in there and not do anything apart from class. But, as I’m sure any upperclassman will tell you, life at RPI, or at any college, is much more fun when you’re doing something constructive outside of academics.
