Midterm season is imminent, and the majority of students I know are creating study schedules and listing grades they plan on achieving.
Currently, I have 10 pastel-colored Post-It notes on my wall, each detailing my ultimate dreams, my UCLA goals, fall quarter objectives, quotidian missions and so on.
It sounds chaotic, but writing out my aspirations actually helps consolidate my focus on the tasks that need my attention. UCLA is undoubtedly entertaining, and striking a happy harmony between school and friends is seemingly child’s play.
That is, until you begin to tarry in your schoolwork and impede your dreams with less than stellar grades.
Beguiled by more amusing momentary gratifications, losing your sense of direction is facile.
And this is where UCLA can step in and provide a workshop, among the many that it already provides, that is actually valuable, one that teaches students how to realize their dreams by writing them down.
Currently, Academic Success Workshops are offered for students in Covel Commons. These classes run the gamut from learning various memorization techniques and speed reading to assisting students prepare for a career in medicine.
A few sound mildly effective, such as “”˜Schmoozing’: How to Network.”
And although I didn’t attend one lest I completely waste my time, for the most part, these workshops seem useless for other UCLA students, too. The caliber of students who attend this school have already developed efficient study skills in high school.
Among the workshops, there is one called “Finding Your Motivation to Succeed,” which entails unearthing methods to “rekindle your motivation and desires to succeed at UCLA and in life.”
But a lesson on spurring a craving for personal eminence is completely unnecessary. Whatever their definition of eclat may be, everyone wants to obtain success.
We all have visions for ourselves. Ranging from the easily attainable to the incredibly lofty, our visions could be gaining that flawless beach body or acquiring a full-time job at a prestigious investment banking firm.
But overcoming unappealing obstacles precedes achievement, and the allure of fun and its extreme potential to distract is hardly a recondite secret.
The workshops’ lessons are valuable only if students continue to put their ambitions first. So UCLA should also offer effective workshops that help students focus their attention on their ambitions.
A study done by Gail Matthews, a psychology professor at Dominican University of California, verifies the benefits of written aspirations: People who write their objectives achieve 76 percent of their goals whereas people who do not achieve only 43 percent.
When asked why such a disparity in success exists, Matthews said, “It has to do with making an implicit commitment to yourself when you write down your goal. … It helps to focus your attention on what you want or need to do.”
A workshop on setting goals can provide students with counseling from the more sage and experienced. Administrators who head the workshop can shepherd students into undertaking the proper steps to reach their goals, from inception to development to realization.
Goal-setting promotes advancement in all undertakings. Akin to a to-do list, elucidating goals results in increased efficiency, an eager intensity in tasks and an avoidance of extraneous ventures. And because goal-setting induces progress, perceived feelings of happiness and self-confidence will rise. You can’t lose.
On the other hand, Matthews said those who were instructed to not write down their objectives often failed to recollect them.
To obviate this lack of focus, breaking down idealistic dreams into smaller, short-term aims is paramount for students, allowing formidable aspirations seem feasible.
And these are all techniques a workshop can easily share with students.
Of course, manifesting ambitions into a tangible lexicon of goals does not guarantee fruition. Nothing is ever gratis. Much of realizing aspirations depends on students prioritizing their dreams over other more enticing activities: going to dinner with a friend versus studying for next week’s test.
But a list will act as a glaring, red stop sign when this happens, and UCLA must act for its students and offer a workshop on dream compositions because of their obvious benefits.
Think writing down your goals is unnecessary? E-mail Lee at jlee@media.ucla.edu. Send general comments to opinion@media.ucla.edu.