Top 10 best things about being a student
illustration by Alex Martin
DESPITE THE OVERWHELMING stress, anxiety, cost of tuition fees, relationship mishaps, low standard of living, and schoolwork, students are pretty lucky. It seems far too easy to get weighed down with what’s wrong with our lives when, really, young people need to realize the unique benefits the 17–27 set can enjoy all the way to convocation (and sometimes beyond). In honour of our annual list issue, the Fulcrum editorial board has decided to announce the top ten reasons why students have got it pretty good.
10. The never-ending academic career
If you like being a student, you can do it forever. Not only can you drag out an undergrad degree for about seven years at the U of O, but you can take up to four years for a master’s degree and spend up to six years in a doctoral program. And if that’s not enough, you can make a career out of it, too—most profs are just students who didn’t want to leave. If you hang around long enough, the university is bound to give you tenure, and then not even God can fire you (please note that when the Fulcrum asked about tenured professor Denis Rancourt’s firing from the U of O, God declined to comment).
9. I’m not a girl (or boy)… not yet a woman (or man)
As you remain caught between adolescence and adulthood, there are still many things you can get away with. To some extent, it is even socially acceptable to do not-so-socially acceptable things: drinking before noon, wearing pajamas all day (to school, to get groceries, to the pub), drunken public urination, etc. You may be officially referred to as adults, and recognized as such by the government, but you are not actually expected to act like them.
8. No risk, no reward
You can take risks, because you really have nothing to lose. A failed physics experiment won’t ruin your professional reputation because you don’t really have one yet, and frankly, you can’t lose money you don’t have. You can also quit that part-time retail job with the crappy pay and just delete it from your resumés later on—once you’ve properly padded it with much more prestigious restaurant-kitchen experience.
7. Schedule? What schedule?
You can choose your wake-up time by refusing to schedule classes before noon. Consequently, you can party any, and all, nights of the week.
6. Special treatment
You get your own admission category. At movie theatres, plays, conferences, museums, events, and galleries, students can usually gain entrance for a few bucks cheaper. And complain if you will about Greyhound and VIA Rail service, but they’ll take you anywhere in this country for a lot less, too.
5. We can eat anything
Your digestive systems are known to magically survive on Mr. Noodles and nothing else, for weeks. And if that supply runs out, there is always free food somewhere on campus. There is no shame in believing in the magic of gratis grub as wholeheartedly and exuberantly as children believe in Santa Claus or the Tooth Fairy.
4. We can drink anything
After spending little to no money on cheap and/or free food, you automatically have more funds at your disposal—for beer purchasing. And when you wake up too late in the day after that night of drinking and need to finish that 15-page paper, you can proceed to survive solely on coffee and other forms of caffeine. This means more time for everything! Unfortunately, this skill/art/technique/science/gift seems to vanish once the diploma hits your hand.
3. Horton’s Law applies
This law dictates that a Tim Hortons is never more than a 10-minute walk from any student, at any time. And if there isn’t one, a student union is on hand dedicated to solving problems like these.
2. The (good kind of) campus clique
You get to be part of an exclusive group. Campus is basically like the Vatican—it is a highly specific community within a city, it has its own currency (in Food Services cards), its own security, its own residences, a seriously old library, and vials of highly unstable antimatter hidden deep within its hallways (thanks, Dan Brown).
1. We answer to ourselves
There may be assignments and part-time jobs to think of, but when you get right down to it, being a student means being your own boss. You don’t really have to worry about your careers and pleasing your superiors, living by your parents’ rules, or paying off a mortgage. Really, this is the closest you’re going to get to pure freedom until you hit retirement age 40 years down the road—which is pretty damn awesome.
editor@thefulcrum.ca
