Vincent's Freshman Time Capsule

Surprising Classes

Some of my classes at UMD have pleasantly surprised me. Other than my Scholars colloquium, the class I was most surprised by was my Physics class, PHYS261. Learning about the fundamental forces and how they work gave me a much richer understanding of the world. In particular, there are subtle facts about magnetism that my previous understanding of magnetic north and south poles could not explain (such as electromagnetic induction), that were cleared up once I took this class. I discovered this class because I wanted to fill my lab requirement while also taking a challenging course, and the Physics sequence at UMD seemed to do that well. If a similar Scholars student wanted to pursue similar surprises to this one, they should follow my strategy: take challenging intro-level classes that you're somewhat curious about. I would particularly recommend this strategy for the most intellectually curious incoming students.

Connecting With Faculty

In addition to classes, I have also developed strong relationships with faculty members at UMD. One of my greatest successes in this regard was reaching out to Professor Wiseley Wong, a math professor here, asking about research opportunities. We scheduled a time to talk, and ended up talking about combinatorics and graph theory for over an hour. He left me with a couple open math problems to mull over, and for the next week or so, those problems were all I could think about. I wasn't able to make any progress, but it was fun to think about them anyway! The greatest obstacle to achieving this seemed silly in retrospect: I knew about this professor after only a couple weeks at UMD, when my math professor at the time referred me to him, but I could not find the motivation to draft a cold email to him until spring. Overall, I'm glad I finally did though, even if it took me a while. For incoming students who want to develop strong relationships with faculty, I would highly recommend talking to your professors. Not only are your professors great faculty members to talk to, they can also refer you to other faculty members that you would get a lot of value from connecting with!

Adjusting To UMD

To help me adjust to the university, I've found my math friends to be the most helpful. My math class has very difficult problem sets, so we often will meet in the lounge and discuss the problems with each other. Since we have this shared experience, it makes it easier to open up about other problems we have that pertain to university life, and give each other advice and support. A significant obstacle to pursuing relationships that I faced was that I initially didn't know where I would find them. Should I join more extracurriculars? Make friends in my classes? Meet random people in the dining hall? Looking back, the answer was clearly to make friends in my math class, but this was not so obvious back then. I had to try lots of different things to see what worked. For incoming students, I would recommend a similar approach: try as many things as you can, especially if they involve meeting other people, and see what works. It also helps if you are seeing the same people over and over again, which makes it easier to build a closer relationship with them.

What I Was Unprepared For

In retrospect, I was least prepared for the changes associated with leaving my old friends. I went to Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology, where I had found a friend group that kept me grounded and, in my opinion, made me a better person. Without them, I had to put more effort into making sure that I was changing as a person in a way that I would endorse. I would say I mostly succeeded in this, but it took a lot of thinking about what type of person I want to become. For prospective students with this concern, I would recommend a similar strategy: think hard about who you want to become. Also, if it is possible, keep in touch with your old friends! After all, you became friends with them for a reason. I haven't been as successful at this as I would have liked, but if you do maintain connections with your old friends, you'll be in good shape.

Last modified: May 9, 2024