Summer Malaise (not really)
I spent most of my summer taking summer classes, hanging out with my friends and girlfriend, working part-time, and working a legislative internship I’d gotten with my local CA state assemblymember. I was very tempted to take the summer easy and slack off, but I’ve found that my brain seems to atrophy when I’m not productive for an extended period of time, something I paid dearly for in high school.
I’d actually started the internship during the previous semester, but it only started getting interesting around this time, when I started being given more substantial work, work that I would later put on my college application. I’d started getting assignments to help set up events and contact businesses. Before that, I’d mostly been taking calls and performing odd jobs that needed to get done.
College Apps Season
The first semester of my second year was my most frantic. Student government exploded, expanding from about nine members total to over twenty in the first month. As Vice-President, my chief responsibility was to train and manage this sudden influx of members. I found that the old methods were meant for much smaller groups, and as such, had to completely rethink how student government training worked.
At this time, I was also helping to start a club called the International Business Association and I was the Treasurer of the Alpha Gamma Sigma Honor Society (AGS). Needless to say, my schedule was packed. On top of this, college apps were just around the corner….
College apps. They’re probably the reason you’re on this site and they’re one of the single most stressful aspects of CCC life (besides maybe finals). I’ll be going into exactly how I created my application and some of the lessons I learned, but I will say that the overall lesson I learned is that peer editing is the single most important tool in creating a good transfer application.
Around the time college apps came around, I was also filling out applications for a number of scholarships. I ended up winning a place on the All-California Academic First Team and became a National Coca-Cola Silver Scholar. I also won the highest statewide AGS award. I feel like a broken record saying this, but this as well will be the subject of a later article.
Home stretch
My last semester was largely a time of introspection and career planning. It was around this time that I formulated a plan to get into the best law school I possibly could. I began hardcore planning and studying for the Law School Admission Test (LSAT). I also began looking into improving various skills I would need to be successful wherever I transferred. I began to look into speed-reading and study-technique books such as Cal Newport’s How to be a Straight A Student, which I would recommend, especially for liberal arts students.
Denouement
My exploration of Cal Newport’s books proved to be an apt reflection on my time at CCC. One lesson in particular resonated with my experiences. Newport often talks about how the most impressive students, the ones who have amassed a volcano of achievements and make you wonder whether they got any sleep, are not necessarily geniuses armed with time-turners ala Hermione Granger. Rather, they have experiences and achievements that build upon themselves to create a resume that makes the person more impressive than they would if they diversified.
For example, joining student government in my first semester eventually helped me obtain and succeed at the position of both Vice President of student government and VP of AGS. Obtaining these roles helped me to get my internship which, combined with the other two roles, helped me win my national and state scholarships. Having these roles and achievements helped me get into UC Berkeley. In this way, becoming a senator in student government created opportunities for better roles and achievements. Things like the awards did not take much extra time, they were merely functions of the activities I’d already done. Additionally, the net amount of time I had to spend on my outside activities didn’t get out of hand because I didn’t overload with varied activities, I instead moved vertically in the activities that I did partake in.
