Hi!
People realize at
different points in college that where they are is an awesome and precious time
that doesn’t come again in life. It is
abounding with opportunities, resources, and tons of people. If you want to do something, there will be someone
to support you and do it with you. If
you want to learn a new skill or get involved in a new activity or hobby, there’s
probably a bunch of people doing it already.
The opportunities are endless, and the community is priceless.
My name’s Preston
Chang. I came to Rutgers in Fall ’08
majoring in Mechanical Engineering, switched to Packaging Engineering in Fall
‘11, and graduated in Spring ‘13!
My hope in writing this
document is to share with you, the reader, the things I’ve learned in my time
at Rutgers – things I wish I knew in my earlier years of college.
In General
• Explore! A lot of the following things pertaining to
Rutgers campus itself have been discovered by wandering and exploring. Find some friends and spend some time going
to areas of the campus you’ve never been to, even if you think you know what
it’s like, and even if other people
have told you what it’s like. Experience
it for yourself before you make judgments, or else you might miss out on some
awesome things!
• Negativity
Negativity goes a long
way – remember this. Are you bashing
something for no reason? Do you have a
negative opinion about someone/something/somewhere because that’s the general
consensus? Consider if negativity should
have a place in your daily speech, or if it can be omitted without issue.
Opportunities
• Recreation
centers! In the real world, people spend
their hard-earned dollars on gym memberships.
Weird, right? In our college
world, we have unlimited gym membership as part of our tuition! WOoooo so go and lift or swim or play a sport
or something!
• Discover and pursue
your interests. There are tons of clubs
and groups and organizations that do everything you could possibly think of
doing. If you’re into board games,
dance, math, cycling, rowing, you name it – there’s a group of people
interested in that same thing, waiting for you to join. This is how you make great friends, by
meeting people with the same passions.
• Time. Think about how you spend your time- is it beneficial to others and yourself? Are you being a good steward of the time, resources,
people, and opportunities that God has entrusted to you?
Living
I’ve lived in these
dorms for my five years on campus: Metzger, McCormick Low-Rise, Crosby, Newell
(that’s on Douglass), Morrow.
Suites are awesomeeee! Excellent location, friends, etc. Apartments are cool, too, if you’re into
cooking and stuff. Not much to say here
other than find some awesome friends to live with :D
Food
This section is
probably going to be controversial.
There will be people with strong opinions. There will be people with no opinions. And, the worst, there will be people with
opinions that are only based on the opinions of others. The bottom line is: go eat at all these
places for yourself, multiple times,
and form your own opinion from that. If
ever there was a topic which I found people to be most easily close-minded
about (including me, at one point), it’s the dining halls at Rutgers. You might not like one thing, but someone
else will. Don’t say it’s objectively
bad. (Unless it actually is. Like Busch Chinese food LOL)
• Livingston! This place is heaven. Mongolian grill is deeeeelicious, the burger
bar is excellent (even if just for the fries), and the quality of food is
pretty much consistently a step above other dining halls. The food quality here doesn’t degrade on the
weekends, which is excellent.
• Brower! I wholeheartedly enjoy Brower. They have sushi every single night
(vegetable, eel, salmon, crab, chicken teriyaki), and many times I would go
there and eat just sushi for dinner.
They also have a cooked-to-order dish each night of the week [i
think], with Monday nights being a yummy noodle bar. Brower doesn’t earn many points for being the
only dining hall without a carpeted eating section, though.
• Busch! Busch is home to many of us, and as such, it
is perhaps the most familiar and most comfortable. It’s pretty standard, and is a lot like a
glorified high school cafeteria with their chicken fingers and chicken nuggets
and so many tacos. How do you just eat
chicken nuggets for a meal? I don’t
know. The pasta bar is a redeeming
quality, though.
• Neilson! Neilson is quite the yum, for those of you
who have had the opportunity to experience it.
Neilson takeout is also AWESOME, with (small) chicken wings twice a
week, and curly fries (all-you-can-grab) like every single night [i think]. CURLY FRIESSSSSSSS.
• Also, a few other
places where you can swipe for food: Douglass Campus Center, Cook Campus Center
(by the Biel Rd stop), Rock Cafe on Livingston, and Woody’s on Busch.
Transportation
If you have a
smartphone, use the Rutgers iOS app to check Nextbus. It has the option of using your current
location, and is super convenient.
Don’t be afraid of
taking the weekend buses. It’s easy.
1) Figure out if the 1
or the 2 gets you to your destination fastest.
2) Check Nextbus for
when that bus is arriving.
3) Walk to your bus
stop and get on the bus.
4) Get off the bus when
your stop arrives.
So easy! Contrary to popular belief, there aren’t many
instances when the weekend buses are slower than the regular buses.
·
They will be inconvenient if you don’t check
Nextbus and decide to go wait for like 20 minutes at the bus stop.
·
It will take longer than the RexB or RexL if you
have to travel between Busch and Douglass, but it will be less walking. For me, I don’t mind sitting on the bus for
an extra ten minutes if it allows me to get on at the stop nearest to me and
get off at my exact destination stop.
It’s nice to not have to walk to/from Hill Center or Lipman Hall, and
also to not have to transfer buses.
Spend that half hour to read a book, listen to music, or talk to a
friend. (BCC to Biel Road is exactly
half an hour.)
Tip: When a weekend bus
travels between Douglass and Livingston, in either direction, it will stop at
the SAC bus stop along the way. Use this
as a quick way to get to College Ave, or as a quick way to get from College Ave
to Douglass/Livingston.
Scenic
• Rutgers Golf Course –
excellent for stargazing and viewing other celestial sights
• Boyd Park – big,
spacious, runs along the river and is nice to walk around
• SAC Park – totally
random like, why is this even here behind sac?
but it’s pretty nice, especially at night!
• Douglass – this
campus itself has a lot of cool places to go and look at, such as Voorhees
chapel and the field behind it
Church
Get plugged into
one. Commit to the community there. Talk with older people who can mentor you
with the wisdom they have being 5-20 years older than you.
Work
Do it. Excel in it.
Work at it with all your heart because it brings glory to God, because
it is your mission as a student, and because it is a daily test of how you
manage your responsibilities. You may
feel like it is detached from other parts of your life, such as your spiritual
life, or your relationships with people, but it is quite the opposite- it sets the trajectory for your future by
creating a momentum in your actions, and, more importantly, in the way you make decisions.
Fun Stuff
Sign up for the Rutgers
Student Life emailing list!
At the first
involvement fair of my freshman year, I subscribed to Rutgers Student Life, and
I am so glad I did. They send you weekly
emails of stuff going on around campus, sometimes cultural, sometimes boring,
almost always free, and sometimes really awesome. Examples of cool things include comedy shows,
ice-skating, paintballing, mini-golfing, plays at the Cabaret Theatre (which
are really good), limited time exhibits at the Zimmerli, free outdoor movie
screenings, free popcorn in student centers, and more!
[To be added to the
list, send an email to getinvolved@echo.rutgers.edu
]
Neat Places to Go
Busch
The Twinkie in the Physics building
Observatory in the Physics Lab
3rd floor of ARC has a lot of neat
science/physics exhibits
UMDNJ Campus (past the Pharmacy building)
Hill Center (the rest of the building that isn’t the
lecture halls)
Livingston
Rutgers Zone has fun stuff to do and free ice cream
Thursdays!
Lucy Stone Hall (if you feel like going in a maze)
College Avenue
2nd floor and 4th floor of
Rutgers Student Center
Douglass
Voorhees Chapel
Mabel Smith Douglass Library
Two bridges by Nicholas Music Center
Music
If you wanna learn an
instrument, find people around you who play and ask them to help you get
started.
If you can play an
instrument, look for people around you who might be interested in learning and reach out to them to see if they want to
learn. They might be itching to play but
too shy to ask.
Locations of pianos:
LSC, McCormick lounge, Nicholas Music Center
The Nicholas practice room pianos are WONDERFUL. Walk around in Nicholas until you find
them! It’ll be a Douglass adventure :)
Relationships
You’re surrounded by
people. You’re in daily contact with
people you care about. This isn’t an
opportunity you’ll get to have after graduation, so make the most of it
now. Pour into people, take the
initiative to build relationships and support them in what they’re doing. Offer to get each other takeout, print things
for each other, and invest in each other.
These might be the people you’ll have around you for the rest of your
life!
It’s easy for people to
get caught up doing random things on their computers or their phones, sinking
time into social networking sites all day, even when they’re around people. This is where you have to take the INITIATIVE
to get people together to do people things – how many times have you been in a
room where everyone's on their phones/laptops? You see so much potential for bonding and
building fellowship, and everyone would be down to do it, but no one starts it.
Be the one to start it. If you have to, literally get up and be like,
"GUYS, let's do something. You can
sit around on your laptops in your own room, but we're here now, let's make
something happen." Play some games or
do some activities that get people together away from media. (Maybe go to some of those RUPA events
together!)
Be
people-oriented. ENGAGE people. When someone talks to you, listen intently
and respond by asking questions. Make
the most out of your mealtimes with people.
• Knowledge. If you know something, share it! If you find something awesome, tell others about
it! Very much the reason I put together
this document is to share my experience and awesome things with others. Why keep it a secret and hold it to myself? I hope it encourages you to do the same.
• Encourage people! Everyone around you has their own needs,
their own struggles, and their own obstacles that they’re currently in the
midst of overcoming. Give a compliment,
tell someone you appreciate them, write a note on an index card, leave some
candy on their desk – any of these things will go a long way in brightening
someone’s day, and even more than that, it will help foster an environment
where people feel the freedom to express their feelings and positive thoughts
about each other.
Miscellaneous
• Get the Rutgers app
for iOS. It gives you quick access to
the dining hall menus, and also to Nextbus.
Super convenient!
• Keep a book in your
bag that you can pull out to read whenever you have spare time or you’re
waiting for something, whether it’s the bus or your meal buddy. By doing this, you’re being productive by
filling in all those gaps of time that you would otherwise spend playing on
your phone or feeling annoyed that your friend is late to lunch.
• Reply to emails. I’m not joking.
Emails don’t have to be
a long ordeal. If the person is asking
if you can attend something, don’t be a headache for them by waiting until the
night before to give an answer. If you
can go, don’t wait until later so that you can “see if something better comes
up” – make a choice and stick with it.
If you can’t go, reply back and say that you can’t. If you’re genuinely not sure, reply back and
say that you’re thinking about it and that you’ll get back to them by x time. This is called being responsible.
Optional, but personally recommended
• Use Dropbox! Install it on your computer, keep all your
schoolwork in it, and when you have to print something, sign into dropbox.com
in the computer lab and your file is there and ready to go! No need for manual uploading or emailing yourself
or flash drives, and your work is
automatically backed up all the time as you do it, yeyy.
• Computer peripherals
(for your laptop or desktop)! If you’re
going to be on your computer for many hours of your college years, typing up
long papers, doing research with multiple websites and documents open, it’s
nice to be comfortable and efficient with what you’re doing. A monitor gives excellent screen real-estate
and improves your posture, preventing you from needing to be hunched over your
laptop and squinting to see everything.
A mouse allows you to navigate better and increase your efficiency from
not needing to use trackpads, and a stand-alone keyboard gives you freedom,
comfort, and ease of use when doing practically anything, from browsing the web
to writing emails to chugging out long papers.
And even if you don’t
feel like the above peripherals are necessary for now, consider if you’ll be
using them after your college years- if
so, why not have them now for the added efficiency during your college years?
• Get a bike! Riding a bike is exhilarating and freeing, is
a good workout, and it’s nice to be able to get to anywhere on campus in fewer
than five minutes. :)
• Check out these
places!
Chinese Christian
Fellowship: ccf.salt@gmail.com
Rutgers Badminton Club:
rubadminton@gmail.com
With all that said,
there’s still much more to do and discover on campus, and I hope each of you
goes on your own journey to discover the campus.
If you have any
questions, comments, feedback, whatever it is, shoot me an email at prestonvchang@gmail.com – I’d love to
hear from you :)
– Preston
“Study for God because, by His grace, He gave
you a brain and what an honor and privilege it is to be able to think, to
process information, and to study at a school where the education system is
better than most kids can ever dream of. Study, because when you study, you can
become fascinated with what you learn because it all points back to a Creator.
The complexity of the subjects you can’t understand, the math, the sciences,
the languages, the history, the arts, all of it points to a being that is so
much grander and greater, a creator that is way above us, because it takes us
years to grasp the simplest of concepts. Study with joy, because learning
trains your mind to think, so later when you try studying the Bible, you will
have a mind that can think and analyze and deduct the correct interpretation of
the Bible and allow it to transform your life.”
-
Unknown
“The astonishing paradox of Christ’s teaching
and of Christian experience is this: if we lose ourselves in following Christ,
we actually find ourselves. True self-denial is self-discovery. To live for
ourselves is insanity and suicide; to live for God and for man is wisdom and
life indeed. We do not begin to find ourselves until we have become willing to
lose ourselves in the service of Christ and of our fellows.”
-
John Stott
Quotes are great. Read the Bible.
