I came across a list of 101 things you should have done during studies (German) recently and I thought, that it’s more of a list of fun things to do during your studies of social sciences but not so much technical ones. That’s why I made my own list*:
- Attend the lecture “Theory of Relativity 101” and frequently ask “Why?”
- Install games on your pocket calculator.
- Turn off your computer and try to research a current topic only with books from a public library.
- Try to wake up a professor, who fell asleep during your presentation with a sudden enthusiastic expression.
- Go to an exam about “Mathematical Logic” without preparation, because it’s “only logic”. Fail.
- Fall asleep during “Electrical Engineering” at 8 o’clock in the morning.
- Wake up during “Technical Mathematics” at 10 o’clock in the morning.
- Get offered a Schnaps by a professor because he thinks you are too nervous.
- Get in a fight with a professor about the integrity of science.
- Bash social sciences because they’re not “real” science. Get convinced of the opposite.
- Get left behind in a laboratory after opening hours.
- Join a group of nerds.
- Spend 5 days in a row preparing for an exam and oversleep on the day it actually takes place because you are too tired.
- Go to the library for socializing and not for reading.
- Get old exams from the Student Council (Austrian: “Fachschaft”).
- Figure out far too late that all the mathematical courses are easier at non-technical universities than at your university and that you could have completed them there.
- Learn to read the cryptic handwriting of an eccentric professor.
- Disagree with your professor.
- Agree with your professor.
- Know at least the first 10 digits of Pi by heart.
- Make friends with the librarian.
- Make friends with your favorite (grumpy) waiter at your favorite coffee house.
- Play hooky a lecture and discuss the matter with your fellow students.
- Write a technical paper and only use the feminine form.
- Attend an super important scientific conference at a very pleasant place such as Hawaii.
- Learn how to program. Even if you don’t study computer sciences.
- Let other fellow students copy from you during a course.
- Study a semester abroad at a university that is on the other side of the world.
- Don’t do anything for your studies for an entire semester. Really nothing. (Can be combined with 28.)
- Learn to use LaTeX – hate it first but fall in love with it later.
- Win a price for your master thesis and spend the price money with your friends in a bar.
- When a tutor discusses the wrong layout of your paperwork, try to convince him that it was the printer’s fault.
- Correct a scientific Wikipedia article.
- Work as a tutor and teach freshmen.
- When you finished your thesis and still have some time left during the semester take a random course – because you paid for the whole semester.
- Take at least one course about “Soft Skills & Gender Studies”.
- Invite your thesis supervisor for a drink after your defensio.
- Spill your coffee over the “Maths Basics” book. On purpose. Alternatively burn it.
- Submit a paper containing only lorem ipsum for peer review to a scientific conference.
- Get good grades at the “Analysis II” exam although you never ever will need it again in your entire life.
- Write a cheat sheet with formulas. Then write it again but smaller. And then smaller again. And again. Until you memorize it.
- Read The Hitchhiker’s Guide and use the number 42 as often as possible.
And what was the funniest thing you did at the university?
* I accomplished some of these things during the ten years at the Vienna University of Technology, others I suggest you do.
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