Student Blog: My Graduation “Bucket List”

College is different from high school in that you’re entirely responsible for what you take away. Physically, of course, you hope to take away an expensive piece of paper, but by the time you walk away with your degree hopefully you’ll have confidence that you have something that sets you apart from the other 30-something percent of Americans who have a Bachelor’s degree.

Professors will pound into your head the idea that college is this time to learn and grow as much as possible. I wish I would have run with that idea a long time ago, but, the thing is, there is so much to do in college that I was a bit overwhelmed and didn’t do much about it until this year. Thus, this blog post is a list of things I wish I had done to prepare myself for my post-degree life.

1. Develop an unexpected interest.

Take advantage of 2-unit courses at USC. You can take dance, wheel throwing, or guitar, but be able to speak passionately about at least one thing. In a job interview you never know what will set you apart from the crowd. After all, who would you remember: a business student who tells you how he worked extremely hard to get a good grade in ECON or a business student who laments the misadventures of his first day in pottery class?

2. Learn an entirely new skill or explore a new subject.

Take advantage of General Education courses that you wouldn’t normally have a chance to take within your major. You might develop a potential double major or minor. Think of skills that would be useful to have after college and search for courses to develop them. Last semester I took a publication design class and learned how to use Photoshop and InDesign, and this semester I’m taking a website design course. If a course you want doesn’t exist, make it a goal to teach yourself a new skill in a semester.

USC has a great Information Technology Program (ITP) that has technology classes such as web publishing and app design oriented toward non-Computer Science majors.

3. Get a part-time job.

This is something that I might have done a little too well in college. Currently I have four part-time jobs, which has definitely been difficult to balance, but I can honestly say that each has helped prepare me for a future career in some way. Even jobs that I originally picked up just for extra money, such as working at the front desk of a fitness club in Downtown, have developed my people skills and provided me with opportunities to network.

4. Network.

Managing relationships well can never hurt. Stay in touch with professors, bosses, and especially students. The people you’re in school with now will continue to grow with you and be the leaders of tomorrow, so don’t alienate yourself.

There are four points on this list and around four years in college, and here I am in my last semester of senior year attempting to cram all of these into a few months. You definitely don’t have to follow everything on this list, but coming into college my advice is to make a list of your own of one thing you’d like to accomplish each year and go from there. Otherwise, graduation will definitely creep up on you.