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Welcome, Incoming Freshmen!

Dear baby Anteater,

Congratulations on your acceptance to UCI! The accomplishments that have enabled your success throughout your academic journey are admirable, and I am sure that the future achievements you will fulfill at UCI and beyond are numberless. I want to extend a warm welcome from one Anteater to another, and excite you for the beginning of your undergraduate career. You will make connections with friends and faculty that will last a lifetime, engage in classes and extracurricular activities that will leave a lasting impression on you, and make an abundance of memories that you will cherish far after graduation.

Granted, you may feel doubtful or uneasy about the transition from high school to college, and understandably so. The many changes that the transition entails can be jarring and even overwhelming at times, but there are resources on campus that you should feel free to utilize to enhance your college experience. For instance, some students struggle with the fast pace of the quarter system at the beginning of their first year, including myself. It takes time to get accustomed to how quickly the weeks seem to fly by, so if you find yourself falling behind or in need of help, there are a variety of facilities on campus that can assist you, such as the Learning and Academic Resource Center (LARC) and the Center for Excellence in Writing and Communication. The interactions that I have had so far with academic advisors have all been positive, as they are more than willing to help and answer any questions or concerns that you may have.

“College is what you make of it.” This piece of advice was given to me before I began my freshman year, but I did not fully understand its significance at the time. Now that I have spent approximately two and a half quarters at UCI, I have better grasped the meaning of the phrase. What with the countless opportunities that a college like UCI offers you, taking advantage of the resources at your disposal can drastically change and improve your college experience. So, if a club catches your eye at the Anteater Involvement Fair, join it. If a particular class seems to satisfy your intellectual curiosity, consider pursuing it. If you want to reach out to a peer, faculty member, or advisor, foster that connection. I strive to continue applying this advice to my own undergraduate career, and I urge you to do the same.

Your friendly neighborhood Unaffiliated major,

Sabrina

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Welcome Admitted Anteaters!

Dear Admitted Anteater,

First off, let me just congratulate you on your acceptance into UCI! Your hard work throughout high school has brought you to this moment in your life. UCI is an amazing school that offers you many opportunities for academics, research, extracurricular activities, and self-discovery. The memories, connections, and experiences you will make will be unforgettable.

Starting off your first year of college is undeniably an intimidating experience. I know I was extremely nervous coming to Irvine as an out-of-state student. However, my initial fears disappeared and my first year has become a core memory in my life. During my first week in the fall quarter, I used my time to try and expand my horizons socially and with extracurricular activities. The Anteater Involvement Fair was one of my favorite memories during the fall quarter. My roommate, suitemate, and I bonded while exploring some student organizations, fraternities and sororities, and club sports. For the rest of the fall quarter, I attended clubs I was interested in, met some new people from those clubs, and created so many memories. Also, I became friends with my hallmates through hall events, hanging out in the common room, and eating dinner together either at Brandywine, Anteatery, or UTC. One of my favorite memories with my friends was going to BCD Tofu House, Somi Somi, and Plush Karaoke Lounge as a celebration after finishing our fall quarter-finals.

My winter quarter was a time when I started to become very involved with a student organization on campus through their internship as well as starting practices for their cultural night. I also started to take more difficult courses related to the major I want to declare. This quarter was when I started to become more stressed and experienced receiving a heavier workload. I believe that there is no avoiding this stress, but there are ways to deal with it. I discovered a few ways of destressing and learned how important breaks are. I will admit that my winter quarter was very difficult for me, but it taught me how to deal with stress and different time management skills. 

Next year, I am looking forward to continuing on pursuing my academic goals. By the end of this quarter, I am hoping to declare my major. I potentially want to become more involved in more clubs. There are so many opportunities on campus I want to pursue, one of them being research. As an incoming anteater, I hope you’re excited about the next 4 years at UCI. See you around campus next year!

From your 2021-2022 ZotBlogger,

Kylie Hadden

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Cheers for the life you’re about to embark on!

Unbelievable! A full year has passed since I decided to come to UCI to complete my university studies! This time last year, I had absolutely no idea what my college life would be like. All I cared about was the free summer vacation that was coming. A year may sound like a long time, but when life becomes full and intense, it becomes difficult to notice the passage of time. This is exactly my evaluation of my college life in this nearly one academic year. 

A busy life also means a lot of trouble. For one thing, I had never tried a Quarter class before and wondered if it was too fast. But having experienced it over the last few semesters, I’d say it’s pretty awesome. Shorter semesters mean a faster pace of study, often leading to a mid-term just a few weeks into the semester (some courses have more than one mid-term!). This means that we need to constantly review what we have just learned, which is a great aid to memory. The knowledge that has been tested multiple times is also more likely to be processed by your brain as long-term memory. At the same time, the Quarter system has one extra semester per year than the semester system, which means we can try a wider variety of courses. UCI offers a wide variety of courses and experiencing a wide variety of courses satisfies many people’s curiosity. More importantly, it helps undeclared students find fields of interest or majors that suit them. Many undergraduate students declare the major they want to study when they apply for university, but after several semesters of study, some of them give up the existing major and choose another. There are several friends around me who have found that their interests are not what they once thought they were, so they changed their major to U/U and resumed their efforts to pursue the goals they are truly passionate about. Since I was not very clear about the major, I wanted to study in the future in high school, I chose U/U, which proved to be the right choice. When I was not clear about my direction, U/U’s designated Advisor and Peer Advisors gave me a lot of useful advice. This gave me a certain understanding of multiple majors (from different departments). My friends who decided on their majors from the start told me that they are only working hard towards their majors, sometimes they feel very hard and doubt their original intention. Therefore, I believe that the amount of time and energy spent on identifying my goals is well worth it. 

All in all, welcome to all of you who are going to be a member of UCI! Please look forward to your upcoming college life and enjoy it! 

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End of the Freshman year

Dear new student,

I can’t believe it’s been almost a year since I came to college. During this year, I’ve learned a lot. I have made a lot of progress both in study and life. Before I went to university, I added the school group, and then found the corresponding group according to my major. I also added several friends, one of whom chatted with me very much. And coincidentally, she and I became roommates. It really added a lot of happiness to my college life.

The first 10 days of college are confusing. I just spend my days in the dorm, watching TV shows and playing video games. After that, the class begins in earnest. I don’t know why my class is so much, and the specialized courses of university are quite difficult. Anyway just the classes felt that divide of feeling that the university knowledge is hard to add, especially in many classes. Having the mind to drop a class can make a person feel very tired. Though the people around you also are very good, you may feel very confused, have no confidence in oneself, and make you want to go home.

But after two weeks, I got a little more comfortable with it. Confusion about the above as well as discomfort about university. Before entering university, I thought that college life would be very colorful and I could travel outside every day, but the fact is that there is endless homework and papers every day.  I am still not fully resolved, but want to tell you, if you feel the same emotions, don’t be afraid, this is every freshman experience, you can turn to the teacher, friends, and parents, and you are supposed to speak to them, the mood will be better, perhaps also to solve the problem.

Good luck!

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Among Us

Hello everyone, for those of you still feeling weight from SIR. Have no fear your fellow Anteaters are here; we’ll take care of you and answer all your questions. Let me start off with saying congratulations and welcome to UCI, you are officially a proud anteater and now the hard part is over with. Let us help you with the even harder part and as someone who experienced everything firsthand, it definitely helps. During my first quarter here, it was definitely a spike in adrenaline from moving in to eating and becoming the next Dora the explorer with my trusty backpack. For once, I was actually happy about going to class, until I got out of class but let’s not digress. Everyone’s experience is definitely going to be different from mine. Your story is not going to be my story and that’s really cool. I’m already excited for you, and I haven’t even met you. Why shouldn’t you be too?

My personal advice is to put yourself out there, walk around campus and see what events are going on. Trust me, we will do our best to make home feel like home. Make friends, socialize, and remember if they don’t click, don’t force it. I promise you they are not worth it and their plenty, when I say plenty of fish in the sea. Also, a personal advice from this sensei right here: do not and I repeat do not take everything to heart. Your dorm life will be 10x harder than it should be if you do, it should already be a given that living with other people isn’t going to be the best experience. Remember some of you haven’t lived with someone that’s not family, heck you probably never lived with anyone before. Don’t be so hard on yourself, but that doesn’t mean you should use that as an excuse to be a “bad roommate”.

This is Blogger Ant Signing Out!!!!