How to Develop a Community of Support By Mia Watson Common struggles with classes, finances, and all the various issues that arise in life can make success feel illusive at UCLA. Every quarter tens of thousands of students compete to achieve high GPA’s and other accolades that indicate success, but as we know, not everyone makes the grade. Staying focused is essential to overcoming these challenges, but it is not the only strategy for achieving our goals. Relying on our community of support can helps us acquire new skills, point us in the right direction, and keep us motivated when we would otherwise throw in the towel. Everyone knows that networking is essential to career success, but often we don’t apply this belief to our academics. Top performing students rarely make this mistake. When working harder and staying disciplined isn’t enough, they turn to a well-developed network to help them navigate obstacles both big and small. By identifying like-minded peers, sharing knowledge and resources, seeking direction from reliable sources, and implementing collective study strategies, all students can be effective at navigating the university, even in spite of our economic and social deficiencies. Even with this knowledge, many students find it challenging to establish a strong network and default to an existing network that may be anything but effective. Here are a few tips for building your ideal network, and ultimately achieving your academic goals: 1. Remember all networks are not good networks - using our default network isn’t always the best decision when it comes to achieving our goals. We must be selective in differentiating between who can help us and who can detract us on our path to success. 2. Find peers with common goals – there is a lot to be said about working with a group that shares the same goals. When you are discouraged or distracted you are able to draw from the motivation of others to get back on track and get the work done; not to mention sharing strategies and information that may be otherwise difficult to obtain. 3. A group that studies together, graduates together – surrounding yourself with people with healthy academic practices will bring out the best in you. Be social, talk about your personal goals and challenges, but don’t forget to actually study together, go to offices hours together, and seek out tutoring and other support collectively. 4. Distribute labor – you can’t do it all yourself so divide the reading, take turns going to office hours and getting questions answered. Do whatever it takes to work smarter and within your time constraints. 5. Identify what skill/knowledge you need and find someone who has it – be strategic about looking for specific people who can help you achieve your goals. All academic networks should include faculty, students, administration, and general staff. You’ll need all these groupings of people to truly learn the campus landscape, understand the rules, and develop strategies that work best for you. There are great rewards to developing a strong community of support. Even if it seems daunting try implementing at least one tip during the course of this quarter and apply it to a specific class or goal you’d like to achieve. Developing this skill now will not only help you graduate strong, but it can help you to secure employment post-graduation, and ultimately help you to land the job of your dreams.

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Page 1: How to Develop a Community of Support

How to Develop a Community of Support By Mia Watson

Common struggles with classes, finances, and all the various issues that arise in life can make success feel illusive at UCLA. Every quarter tens of thousands of students compete to achieve high GPA’s and other accolades that indicate success, but as we know, not everyone makes the grade. Staying focused is essential to overcoming these challenges, but it is not the only strategy for achieving our goals. Relying on our community of support can helps us acquire new skills, point us in the right direction, and keep us motivated when we would otherwise throw in the towel.

Everyone knows that networking is essential to career success, but often we don’t apply this belief to our academics. Top performing students rarely make this mistake. When working harder and staying disciplined isn’t enough, they turn to a well-developed network to help them navigate obstacles both big and small. By identifying like-minded peers, sharing knowledge and resources, seeking direction from reliable sources, and implementing collective study strategies, all students can be effective at navigating the university, even in spite of our economic and social deficiencies. Even with this knowledge, many students find it challenging to establish a strong network and default to an existing network that may be anything but effective. Here are a few tips for building your ideal network, and ultimately achieving your academic goals:

1. Remember all networks are not good networks - using our default network isn’t always the best decision when it comes to achieving our goals. We must be selective in differentiating between who can help us and who can detract us on our path to success.

2. Find peers with common goals – there is a lot to be said about working with a group that shares the same goals. When you are discouraged or distracted you are able to draw from the motivation of others to get back on track and get the work done; not to mention sharing strategies and information that may be otherwise difficult to obtain.

3. A group that studies together, graduates together – surrounding yourself with people with healthy academic practices will bring out the best in you. Be social, talk about your personal goals and challenges, but don’t forget to actually study together, go to offices hours together, and seek out tutoring and other support collectively.

4. Distribute labor – you can’t do it all yourself so divide the reading, take turns going to office hours and getting questions answered. Do whatever it takes to work smarter and within your time constraints.

5. Identify what skill/knowledge you need and find someone who has it – be strategic about looking for specific people who can help you achieve your goals. All academic networks should include faculty, students, administration, and general staff. You’ll need all these groupings of people to truly learn the campus landscape, understand the rules, and develop strategies that work best for you.

There are great rewards to developing a strong community of support. Even if it seems daunting try implementing at least one tip during the course of this quarter and apply it to a specific class or goal you’d like to achieve. Developing this skill now will not only help you graduate strong, but it can help you to secure employment post-graduation, and ultimately help you to land the job of your dreams.