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Am I screwed?

1K views 8 replies 9 participants last post by  anomalous 
#1 ·
Getting to know professors and being in a large amount of clubs on campus really just isn't my thing. I have yet to find the desire to go to a professor's office and start chatting with him. It produces anxiety, and I don't necessarily need any help...yet. I keep hearing from everyone, "Get to know your professors! Get involved! Do everything, blah blah blah!" Well, what if I don't? What if I go through my college years just getting good grades, playing intramural soccer and perhaps doing one internship? Then what? What if I never meet with my professors outside of my class?
 
#2 ·
That's fine. Getting to know your professors doesn't mean becoming friends with them. It doesn't even mean having a coffee with them. Get to know how they think, read what they have written. You don't need to know that they're having problems at home and might be divorcing their wife. As for getting involved, doing the soccer and interning are both good. On the other hand if you come across a group that interests you, don't be afraid to try it out.
 
#4 ·
It's always a good idea to speak with your professors outside of class, so that you're not just another student. But it's not the end of the world if you don't. I didn't get to know any of my professors and I graduated just fine. In fact I've got 3 of them writing grad school recommendations for me right now. They were happy to do it even though I'm sure none of them really remember me.
 
#5 ·
You could hang around the group of students that stay after to ask questions and act like you had one of the questions the professor answers for another student. Its better than nothing.
 
#6 ·
You don't need to get to know your professors. There are jerk professors around. However you will find the others to be very interesting, often eccentric people who you feel relaxed around. Because you know they are too professional and too intelligent to be ignorant or arrogant to you.

Try asking them a question and see where it leads, you can usually tell the friendly ones just by their demeanor.

"You can tell a lot about someone's personality by how they are" - Harry Hill.
 
#7 ·
It's good to try to get to know a couple profs senior year so you can use them as references for work or grad school once you graduate- but I don't think you have to worry about that freshman year.
 
#8 ·
well i may be weird but im a huge suck up to my professors. and a lot of my professors are really cool. my chem professor is awesome. he stayed alone with me 2 hours after class ended. the first half hour we worked on problems i did not understand. then for an hour we talked about intelligence, IQ, and how i felt that mathematicians were smarter than english majors. he then continued to help me for another half hour. all of my professors are pretty much just as good, but im really starting to like this guy. id suggest definately talking i go to community college though so professors are usually much nicer.
 
#9 ·
Sucking up to professors can pay off in some cases (namely the ones with huge egos to feed). However, I managed to get through undergrad just fine, despite being able to count on one hand the number of times I went to any profs' office hours. I also wasn't very involved in clubs or activities. If you manage to get good grades on your own merit and without asking questions, it shouldn't be much of a problem at all when it comes time to get a job. If you plan to continue to grad school as I did, knowing professors might come in more handy, but it's still not a necessity.
 
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