It’s getting pretty late in the game here: I’m reaching the end of my run as a Technician columnist as I get closer and closer to graduation in May. I feel maybe, in my relative old age, I need to pass on some advice for the kids out there that still pick up a Technician now and again and do more with it than work through the puzzles during class.
I think it might be some form of writer’s conscience catching up with me. I’ll be the first to admit that I’ve written more than my share of self-preening reflection pieces, comic columns meant to do little more than show off my Wikipedia-enhanced knowledge of pop culture and, more recently, sad and pretentious little attempts at some sort of literary sub-artistry in a newspaper. Some kid in the back is probably reading my columns every week and shouting in his head “Ball, man, get to the point all ready!”
Regardless, I firmly intend to leave you today with more than that little smile on your face that I’m usually getting at (I love that smile). You need something you can take in your hand and hurl back at this school: you need advice, an idea, some excitement; and today it’s not going to come in a box with a hole cut out the side.
If there’s one thing I can leave you with, one little piece of advice that you can get some use out of while you’re still in school, it’s this: don’t let them tell you no. There are countless “thems” out there telling you what you can and can’t do. Ignore them.
Take N.C. State as an example. There’s quite a bureaucracy associated with the ins and outs and ups and downs of everything. Now, I wouldn’t put NCSU right up there as a modern marvel in terms of bureaucratic inefficiency: there are plenty of acronyms out there (the IRS, the DMV, ETS) that make our little chunk of Raleigh look like one cobra against the G.I. Joe General. There are good folks at State that are going to help you out when you think you need help and even when you don’t think you need help.
Then there are those tools of the system that have become self-styled gatekeepers and nay-sayers: people that’ll squash your ideas and tell you that you can’t do whatever it is you want to do. When you run into somebody like that, do what you did when you were five years old: if Mom tells you no, go ask Dad.
Do your research; see if that nay-sayer is just stroking the old ego or if he really holds the keys to that lock on your goal. If you’re going to have to take no for an answer, make that gatekeeper regret that answer. Y’all kids need to get up on this stuff if you’re going to keep State great! Don’t take that one extra hour of tailgating like a scrap from the table when you can jump up there and eat the whole meal!
Don’t let the Raleigh City Council and RPD walk all over you with their Nuisance Party Ordinance and their profiling of college students! You are the reason that this city is culturally vibrant and economically successful! Why do you think companies move to RTP? Smart people don’t grow on trees, and they sure as heck ain’t coming out of Chapel Hell or Dookey! The taxpayers of North Carolina have entrusted the city of Raleigh to care for students that will ultimately better our communities. The city ought to be watching our backs, not dismissing us as nuisances to the suburban ideal of life.
Taxpayers are also paying for you to get an education that is, as far as is practicable, supposed to be extended to the people of the state free of expense, according to the State Constitution. Don’t be nickel and dimed by the Board of Trustees and the Board of Governors who keep raising your tuition and student fees every year! If they need money, they can go hit up the legislature with its fancy new lottery instead of sticking their grubby hands back into your nearly empty pockets.
Look, I’m not trying to turn you kids into a bunch of raving activists or tree huggers. Although if you want to hug trees, that’s cool: they need love too. I’m not saying overthrow the system or demonize individuals that are probably just doing their jobs as best as they know. I’m just saying pay attention and don’t take no for an answer or at least don’t take no lightly. In the parlance of our times, grab that net and catch that beautiful butterfly!
Tell ’em you ain’t gonna take it no more at viewpoint@technicianonline.com.
