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Life lessons from students
What was your favourite extracurricular activity that you participated in during your time at UW?
watonomous before it went remote
DanceDanceRevolution
Board games
orchestra@uWaterloo
Design Teams
WatLock
Playing in osu! tournaments as part of the osu! club.
I enjoyed doing art
SERVE tournaments
YuGiOh Club
Poker club
CS Club
MATH Residence Tutor
Volleyball drop in
Playing smash
CSC Karaoke <3
AcaBellas
Volleyball intramurals and drop-ins
mathNEWS
UWACC
mathNEWS, hands down. It's how I made most of my friends, and probably the thing I'm most likely to be remembered for.
Waterloo Ismaili Student Association
mathNEWS, 100%.
Jam Network
Weightlifting, powerlifting
Intramurals
Data Science Club
Imprint
Dance
Ultimate Frisbee
Testing freshly designed games at the game dev club.
Quidditch
Toastmasters
Muay Thai
Ultimate Frisbee Team
Volleyball
Badminton Club
Table tennis club
Limelight
Serve
Ultimate Frisbee, Hackathon Planning
Drag Club
Rock climbing.
Soccer intramurals
UWICA dance team
Volleyball intramurals
Humans VS Zombies
Camping
WaterBoys a capella
Taekwondo
Organizing Hack the North!
Chamber Choir
What is one extracurricular you regret not joining?
not a specific one, but not being an exec of a club
Game development
Volleyball
WiCS
Acapella
astronomy club
Ballroom dancing
CSC and Data Science Club
CSC
Kendo Club Ever
Band/orchestra
intramurals earlier
Blueprint
Animusic Ensembles
Formula SAE
powerlifting
Movie Watching Club
Ultimate Frisbee
Music, singing, band
Intramurals
poker club
Not quidditch lmao
Japan exchange
Joining any club.
Any philosophy courses?
Juggling
A capella
Badminton
Varsity Badminton
A long-term club or organization to stay committed to and get to know people well. Maybe outers club
A dance club of sorts
Hack the north
Humans vs Zombies
Dance crews
Animusic
GSA
UW esports team
UW HipHop
Basketball intramurals
I wish I didn't quite A capella club for a final.
Rizz club LMFAO
What is the best life hack/tip?
develop precise time estimation skills and abuse them to maximize free time
Learn mathematics and become enlightened
it doesn't matter how much you sleep, but when you sleep!
Don't think so hard!!
try everything at least once
Be the first person to apply for a job and your odds of getting it increase tenfold
Talk to other people about best coding practices
Life sucks at times, learn to embrace the bad times
You're usually fine in most situations
Sleep a lot
WW sucks -- apply externally!
Accept who you are and live with it.
Waterloo Star lunch special
Find and do something you enjoy when you are feeling down
Block out times for focus work!
Just hanging around the MC clubs hallway is a surprisingly good way to make friends.
Make friends with people who will get you out of your shell
Go to class
Submit a remark request for everything
Embrace mediocrity. Life is easier to cope with when you assume you're average. But life gets easier when you work towards improving yourself.
Meal prepping
go to costco
Switch out of morning courses and set your alarm as a timer for 8-9 hours of sleep.
simply start assignments early
Start early
Learn to cook, it's fun
Cook one big pot of soup, get those silicone soup molds and pour them in. Freeze em. Then when you need a meal quick, just pop a frozen soup cube out, microwave, you're done.
Keep organized using calendars and spreadsheets. It helped me to meet deadlines and to relieve stress by having a bird's eye view.
Sleep more
Learn ethics
Work-life balance
Anki flash cards. They're actually so strong for so many courses
Forcing yourself to get out of your apartment.
The key to sleeping early is to wake up early
Write notes on everything.
Be someone you'd want to be friends with
I think sleeping matters the most physically and mentally.
Vitamin D is the key to happiness, don't forget to take the supplements! Oh and stay hydrated.
No relationship
Take time to relax.
What is your favourite inspirational quote/words to live by?
its not over until I win
every expert was once a beginner
try everything at least once
"The answer to the universe exists somewhere on the internet, you just need to go find it." -me
Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic. Many things I once thought was magical have lost their magic when you learn about how they work. It's almost a beautiful thing really, coming into computer science and learning the ins and outs of computing to the point where technology stops to marvel you and instead you start to pick up on how things are built and created.
You do what you can, and where you can't, you can't.
Don't worry, be happy
Be yourself.
Patient: It hurts when I do this. Doctor: Then don't do that.
You've got to dig dee
For the experience
You're almost there
Letters to a Young Poet by Rilke
It's all about the mindset.
No one can make you feel inferior without your consent.
"It is possible to commit no mistakes and still lose. That is not a weakness, that is life." -Jean-Luc Picard
Live, love, laugh
The worst feeling is when the person you are meets the person you could've been
Don't be sad that it's over; be happy that it happened
Sometimes it do be like that
Born to shit, forced to wipe
Touch grass
An airplane always takes off against the wind
"Hesitation is defeat." - John Sekiro
Hard work is not your purpose of living.
Follow your own way and let people talk.
Live by no words.
It's our choices that show what we truly are, far more than our abilities.
The most important step to take is the next one.
Just Do It
Go big or go home
What is your most embarrassing story from your time at UW?
I fumbled a girl that wanted me first, twice o.o
I was at a party and knocked over their entire coat rack. The coats were everywhere :///
naked mile
Accidentally accepted a video call while naked in bed with gf
I was pulling an all nighter and was really sleep deprived I walked into the girls bathroom by accident.
Having to sit through a 45 minute technical interview when it was clear to both of us that I had no idea how to do the question
Probably the time i gave this girl a UTI because I didn't wash my hands properly. Wash your hands.
I played trumpet in mkv courtyard at 4am on what I thought was the day after the last day of exams but was actually the morning of the last day of exams
I don't want to say it.
Professor called me to answer a question in ENGL 306A, and I had no idea how to answer the question.
Holding hands with one of my friends and insisting it was platonic for several weeks before we started dating
I learned recently that the first person I ever went on a date with here really disliked how loudly I ate ramen, and that it's the only thing her group of friends know about me.
Confessing to a girl that I loved her while I was black out drunk
Accidentally pressed the fire alarm in the CMH gym, which was pretty crowded, in my first year
having a whole conversation with my roommate in first year while there was porn visibly on my computer screen
This girl asked me the 'what are we question' the day before Valentines day when I told her multiple times I wasn't ready for anything serious. I had to end the fling that day, felt like a total dick.
Think a janitor walked in on my bf and I about to kiss on one of our first dates when we were sitting in a classroom lol
I wasn't wearing glasses when meeting up with a friend and mistakenly thought that someone else was them.
I accidentally used the women's washroom in STC.
I failed PD1 by missing a single assignment
Being drunk and inviting my sober friend to a drinking party by baiting him with League of Legends.
Participating in sex toy bingo
Didn't know how to put on the graduation sash during convocation. There's probably more but I can't remember.
I choked on stage during a beatbox battle
What is the nicest thing someone at UW did for you?
complimented me (rare)
Ah so many, but one that was short and memorable was someone complemented my piano playing near the front of DP. That was when I was going through quite a rough time, and thanks to that person, my day was made much better and I also get to keep this memory :).
Tied my shoes
My second year roommate let me use his piano!
Admit me
Ask me to marry them
Let me take MATH 146 without taking MATH 135/145. A prof believed in me :)
Cooked me food :)
My girlfriend does a pretty good job of babying me when I start losing it/panicking over nothing
Let me crash at their place when I had in-person exams when I wasn't in person
Be friends with me
I left my stuff at a friend's place over Covid (I'm out of province), and I didn't grab it until 3 years later.
Agree to be my gf :)
One of my friends stayed up with me all night to help me finish an assignment
Complimented my sweater
I have quite a few examples but one that happened recently was two of my really good friends bought me comfort food (fried chicken), delivered it to my doorstep, at night, without asking, because I told them my grandma isn't doing so well.
A stranger tapped me on the shoulder and told me they liked my outfit.
A person chased me up because I droped my Watcard
firat year math advisor overriding me into a full math class despite being out-of-faculty
My friend just listened to me when I was having a breakdown about not doing well enough on my calculus final on campus (didn't do enough to meet that 60% bar). It meant the world to have someone else just empathize and tell me that retaking a course is not the end of the world.
Someone took a later bus so they could pick up my laptop charger for me.
Give me their cookie when I was crying in the library. Thank you kind sir I will never forget you.
2 professors let me write an exam on the weekend, after the rest of the class, because I was dealing with medical complications.
Given me a job
Stay with me at the hospital for my broken ankle for 3 hours.
Saying that I am the best random person they met in UW
Been my best friend
Staying up late to listen to me talk about my concerns.
Cheer me up when I was visibly upset.
What is one regret you have after finishing university?
Didn't attend more social events
Not going on an exchange term.
I wish I took the time to do a URA.
taking more courses i actually like
Not getting into Jane Street/HRT
Time went by so fast, I would love to be back in second year and get more time on campus and less remote studying.
Not taking more diverse CS courses
Not socializing more in first year
Not spending more time with friends in 1st/2nd year
Caring about marks for too long, and not socializing more earlier
Not taking trains.
Should have been more social
No exchange/coop term in Japan :(
Meet more people
Being in a relationship for the majority of the time.
I wish I didn't grind and stress that hard in first year about career. We're all going to make it :)
Going out and meeting new people/getting into a relationship sooner
Not doing exchange. I wish I prioritized exchange over getting more co-ops.
Not working harder to find a new grad job (we do be living in a tech recession)
I wish I had gotten more involved in campus life sooner. Once I did get involved, it really opened my social life.
I wish I did more co-op terms
Not participating more in the community
Didn't have a relationship
Skipping so many terms on campus because of coop and exchange
spending too much time on assignments in first and second year
Not doing an abroad term.
Didn't study in the first year
Not switching out of CS. I realized that I kind of hated CS in my first year; however, I was too afraid to make the switch.
Not researching more on which courses are worth taking.
Wish I went on EXCHANGE!!! Oh, and not studying harder for my Google APM intern interview :(
never got laid
Not meeting more people
Taking more courses that I personally was interested in - I kept getting talked into taking courses that I was not really interested in and was afraid of taking courses by myself for fear of getting low grades. After getting low grades in these courses and still succeeding, I realize that grades really don't matter that much and I should have learned what I was interested in.
Not having a relationship
drop the ego
Not socializing more and doing more extra-curricular activities
Losing touch with people during Covid
Didn't do enough terms on campus
Not trying harder
Not making better connections
I wish I spent more time making & maintaining friendships.
Not focusing more on the social aspects
Not being more active
not nailing down good study habits or health habits earlier
Losing touch with old friends
Attempting aggravated assault
Not doing more extracurricular activities.
Did not work hard enough in school
Wish I had taken the covid year off, feels like I didn't have enough time on campus.
Not making more friends
I didn't get to talk to more profs. They do know a lot of stuff.
Not spending more time with my friends and not dating : (
Didn't fully take a URA position
I wish I didn't work as hard. I wish I enjoyed life more.
Covid stole half my university experience.
What is one thing that you wish you could tell your first-year self?
grow your hair long so you stop looking 12 years old, hit the gym (dont be scared of not knowing what to do!)
After studying past a certain point, any further studying will only stress you out and will be counterproductive. It is important to take some rest and go hang out with friends more!
Make more of an effort in my first few terms to reach out and strengthen friendships/relationships.
apply to the jobs even if you don't think you'll get the job!
Chill out lmao
ur gay
There's no rush to make friends, find a girlfriend, or get a Cali job -- your main priority should be learning things outside of class
Believe in yourself
Take less PMATH and do more CS
Nothing, it would ruin the surprises that life has in store. It's like saying what do you wish you knew happened in a movie before watching it. Absolutely nothing.
Get out of your shell and go try new things!
Hang out more with the mutual friends
Spend more time studying and less time trying to get laid.
You'll do well -- put in the word and it will pay off
Go out and talk to people
Chill bro
Be more active at joining clubs and meeting new people
To take things slowly but also take more courses during the pandemic. Classes were so much easier then!
make lots of friends
Grades don't matter as much in uni, especially once you find a good coop
You're going to be OK.
Try new things
Join more clubs
Don't take courses with profs with bad reviews
Figure out how to study for finals
Itll be okay
You will achieve much more than you think.
Study plz
Switch out of CS and do Physics/Pure Math.
Struggle hard.
It's not always gonna feel like it's okay, but it's gonna be okay. Grades aren't everything, but
Apply for <jobs, opportunities, etc.> even if you don't think you'll qualify! Do more research in things you might be interested in. I missed a lot of opportunities by not being proactive.
Your hard work will pay off.
drop the ego
Make time for yourself so you don't burn out
It's a big change so don't be too hard on yourself
Leetcode
Make good connections and seek help for your mental health problems
It's not a waste
Take care of your physical and mental health!
You're doing good
Marks are fake, do leetcode
Talk with more people, spend less time in your room. It's more productive to make smart friends and become smart that way.
Have fun while it lasts
Talk to more people and don't care about what they think of you.
Go out there at focus on meeting new people and joining clubs
Focus more on learning to learn rather than grades
Make friends
The clock is ticking. The hours are going by. The past advances, the future recedes. Possibilities decrease, regrets mount. Do you understand, or will you choose to remain ignorant?
Don't put that much time solving other people's issue.
Take URA
Grades are not as important as you think. Take some internships off to travel on your own or chill with family.
Spend time getting better at things so you can be less insecure. Especially exercise.
Sleep more
Don't be afraid to quit things
What is the best lesson you learned from your time at UW?
if you want something you gotta ask for it
Things kinda just happen one way or another so you might as well go with the flow and try to make the best of things.
University is only good for purchasing a degree, to truly learn things you have to be self-taught
There is always someone better than you and everyone has different priorities in life. Compare yourself to your previous self and who you want to be. What other people choose can be inspirational, but worrying about doing less or worse isn't very constructive.
You can learn whatever you wish with the tools you've been given at UW
If you fail a course who cares. The most important things in life won't come from the courses you did badly on, because if you were truly interested and invested in that course, would you have failed?
No one thing should be your only focus, be that school, social life, a job.
Life isn't that serious
Math is fun!!!
There are always talented people here. Don't feel down just because you are ordinary.
Realize that sometimes you need to let things go and failing is an irreplaceable part of being successful.
That everything is fleeting. 4 month cycles really reminds you of that because once you settle into a new home, new roommate situation, new city - everything changes again in just a few short months. Take the time to turn your 4 month house into a home. The goodbyes are painful but so worth it to look back upon each term with fond memories.
Get out of the house.
Look out for yourself and yourself alone
That I'm average in almost every single aspect and there is no use in assume your better than anyone or anything. I'm on a constant journey of learning new stuff. Not necessarily academic but soft skills too.
procrastination is easy to overcome if you understand the value of the work you are doing
People are much dumber than you think they are
You get what you give
Your dreams lie far beyond here. Keep looking forward.
Self-acceptance and how to embrace failures as much as your successes
drop the ego
Time flies, so act now instead of tomorrow
Bad code that works is better than good code that doesn't work
Live in the present moment
Marks are fake
You're not alone, but you're are the one that cares most about your career by a long shot
Networking and connections matter.
What happened has happened, what matters is what happens next
Life is a marathon, not a sprint
How to curl my hair
Plan before you do.
Don't be too harsh on yourself, a lot of things are based on luck. Accept your failures and keep reaching for your goals.
Success is built from daily effort.
Don't try to plan ahead too much!
What is your favourite memory from your time at UW?
finishing trains!
Living in downtown Toronto during my first co-op was pretty sick. Close second is all of the orchestra concerts.
Meeting my gf
All the great times I had with my friends
Walking around in springtime near the nanotechnology building
Living with my best friends at the Hub in the summer
Going to my first party in 4B and just getting fucked up - or nude dude event
Probably getting drunk with friends at a party
Late nights in mkv doing advanced courses
Might be my convocation day?
All my friends gathered together to hear me read a chapter from a story I was writing.
Singing with friends
Performing with the Water Boys at the International Championship of Collegiate A Cappella! We got 3rd place :')
My girlfriend coming to visit me while I was on co-op in California.
Drinking in class during St.Patties
San Francisco
It was when I got an email from a really cool company that I'd gotten an offer as an intern. Also, when I told my parents about this news, in-person, and seeing the smiles on their faces. Nothing matches seeing my parents happy.
friends <3
Late night talks and deep conversations
My friends
walking home from my CS246 demo on a beautiful December morning, having aced the project that had consumed the entire last two weeks of my life
Nights staying in and drinking with my roomates.
It's hard to find the favorite :)
Just getting boba and takeout with friends and eating together on the fifth floor of E7.
many final year friends
Having potlucks, playing board games, and going on trips with friends
Ppl sleeping on my floor
Math in Europe
Coops and exchange
3AM Burger King runs
Late nights in MH with friends, or in SF
Laughing together on the floor of Rev after a night out
Chilling with the boys in WCRI Fenwick, watching anime.
Reading week snowboard trip to Mont Tremblant
Hanging out with my friends in residence
Eating a cupcake I bought from the V1 cafeteria alone in my dorm room on my birthday while listening to Hatsune Miku songs through $8 earbuds from Amazon.
None
Playing piano with friends back in first year when things were fresh and everyone was still together.
Playing board games with friends late into the night.
Getting great coop job