Download This Episode Here Congratulations to Alanna, Brian, and Amit for snagging Ali Bouzari's new book! This monologue is about the ways you can maximize your college experience and hopefully prepare you for the future. You can follow all of these rules, or none of them. I'm just distilling my "complicated" college life. Key Takeaways

Why you need to be involved in college
How to be involved in college
Why my best experience in college wasn't food science related

What We Talk About Lion Dancing Transcript In this episode, I’m going to talk to you the importance of getting involved in college. Before I go into college, don’t be one of those people who thinks college is a waste of time. You can be rich going to college, you can be rich going to trade school, you can be rich by not going to school at all! I’m a bit fatigued about how any people complain about working at starbucks after graduation when the anecdotes between successful people and unsuccessful people are relatively the same. College is indeed, what you make of it. And it’s a time that will really cement how you will deal with life in general. Some people will spend it partying, some people want to find true love, some people want to get experience starting a company, get into the Big 4 Accounting firms, support local communities, or change the world. Me? I’m not sure. I kept my options open. A lot of people get screwed over on college debt. A lot of people have to work two jobs in food service and take classes. I’m going to be honest with you, my parents paid for my college so I was able to focus on more things that other people could not. However, I want to give you service on what I thought was most beneficial in college. This is me sharing my experience and though you may or may not be in my shoes, distilling my experience might enrich your college experience. I hope. At my busiest time in college, I: Had 2 part time jobs: in the pilot plant and in the Multicultural center. I probably wouldn’t survive working there with the wage they paid me. Did 2 product development competitions: Disney and Developing Solutions for Developing Countries Was in 3-5 clubs with 2 being officer positions (Captain of the Lion Dance Team, Treasurer of a cooking club) Was a committee head for a really cool diversity event with 500 people involved. Did an entrepreneurship competition So this involved staying up until 12 to 2am every day. Fun stuff, right? So I didn’t have to do all this, and to be honest, you shouldn’t. What I found valuable from these experiences was the relationships you for by meeting different people. With these relationships, you learn so many things. How to talk to people, how to convince people, how to be charismatic, how to excite a crowd, plan events, count money, take notes, write agendas, align visions, work together. The relationships you kindle when you do these extracurriculars are vital if you choose to go into the career you studied. Or not. But it certainly has helped me with this podcast. So in this episode, I want to give you 5 distinct actions why you should be involved with things in college and 5 distinct actions on how to do it. Let’s begin. Let’s start with “Why”: For some people, getting involved in college can be a way to make new friends, a shiny spot to put on your resume, or because you’re generally a good person at heart, right? Anyways, I have 5 reasons on “why” you should get involved in college especially if you’re in your freshman year. 1. You will look attractive on paper Of course, the most straight forward reason you should get involved is to put it on your resume Here’s some real life advice: it might not be wise to do everything. There are a lot of people who were just good at one thing and got a job super easily. There was this one girl in college, where all she did was talk about wanting to be a plant manager and so she did an amazing job climbing through the ranks of college and grab a leadership position within the Cal Poly Pilot Plant. Her focused experience got her the job quite easily where my sporadic experience…well… took me a while. You can check that out on episode 10. However, getting involved as much as possible does have its perks… For one, you get this huge foundation of soft skills, something that throughout this episode, you’ll come to find out. More importantly, it makes you a more wholesome person, you learn not to be so much of a jerk, and you have increased diversity awareness due to just dealing with different people. However, you can’t fit everything on your resume…but you can on your linkedin profile…

You can’t BS experience

In most interview questions I’ve experienced, I have been able to fit in the question with an answer quite well because of the myriad of experiences. In fact, I could give comprehensive stories on how I delt with the situation. It’s very hard to BS experience, but that’s not to say you can’t. I know a lot of people who BS or stretch the truth, but it doesn’t make them good people. You should be a good person. I think what I really want to get at here is this: most interview questions you’ll get can be answered the best in a story format. It enriches your answer and gives people a much better understanding on who you are as a person. So armed with this knowledge, BSing your answer will make you seem good at first, but you’re probably going to be living a lie throughout your time at work. But some people do it. Some people are very good at lying though, and some people pull through with it. Hey, if it’s what you want in life, then you do you.

You will forge deeper connections

As long as you are consistent at meetings and not a jerk, you will forge very deep connections with people who are involved. It is vital to forge these connections for people who are involved in things because the return on investment is extremely valuable. But you can only forge connections if you are fully committed. Commitment, like many of you guys probably know, is a huge sacrifice because you can only share who you hang out with so much. In a platonic point of view, which club is going to give you the most value from your time? On a deeper level, which friend is going to? And value is very very subjective. Depending on the person, value can mean so many things. At my freshman year, I tried out 30 clubs. In my final year, I peaked my head in about 4. You’d probably go insane if you invested all of your time in 30 clubs. I might have almost did. But you soon realize who or what is more important. I found the people in my department and the diversity-advocate community, along with some food clubs, important to me. Let me give you an example: All of the Cal Poly Alumni who have been interviewed for this podcast were a result of forging deep connections throughout college. Whether it be in classes, clubs, or competitions. If I didn’t forge a good connection with them, I don’t think this podcast would have turned out. They really supported me during the makings of this, and they were the spark that ignited the flame. I really can’t thank my Cal Poly friends enough for supporting this podcast. I’ve worked with Katie and Taryn on food science projects, the IFTSA product development competitions, and other crazy things in my University. Because we were involved in everything together, we trust each other. So I’ll just say another thank you to both of them. 4. You get, and I’m putting this in quotes… “free stuff” One of the funniest things I like to do is post stuff on social media on things I get for free. I used to do it on facebook, instagram, and now snapchat. By the way, every social emdia thing I have is itsmeadamyee, all one word. Free stuff is nice, but as the old saying goes, “there’s no such thing as a free lunch”. I feel like with that mindset, it ruins the involvement experience because it makes you very ungrateful on the free swag (shirt, food, concert pass) that you received. For me, I enjoyed helping people and getting involved so I enjoyed the benefits of the free stuff. Point being, the value you put into something will bring back as much value as you get out of it. Here’s an example: You get paid to go to work for 8 hours a day. You convert hours to dollars. If I spent 5 hours a week feeding the homeless, I don’t necessarily get money, but the value is still there. Feeding the homeless gives me satisfaction, it gives me, purpose, it gives me happiness in times where I feel really bad about myself. Seeing people smile when I give them a can of corn feels good to me. But it can also give other things. What if it gives you the chance to meet a famous person? Or the love of your life? Granted, these are far off, but the point is, you never know. Exposing yourself as a good person to people makes you valuable, and it should strip you of any bad intentions that you think you have. However it’s also an investment, you might not see returns in a month, but it snowballs. Your reputation increases, and the value might return 10 fold. 5. You develop a sense of purpose and meaning So this mainly happens when you get into a leadership position. Especially the VP or President stage. For some people, leading something’s pretty cool, and don’t knock it till you try it. Once you learn to lead something, and get people to do things for a common cause, it’s quite a strange, but satisfying feeling. Especially in hindsight. But people will do it, because they either like you, or the idea. Both help…a lot. With enough leading on something you’re inherently passionate about, you might actually make a difference. For me, it was working on getting Cal Poly to get involved in IFT and entering the product development competitions. Once we actually placed and were able to go to ...