In and out of class, undergrads gain insight from error

Episodes of bad judgment, lousy timing, regrettable purchases, missed opportunities, unfortunate outcomes: Whose career as a student isn’t littered with such misadventure?

With time and reflection, we are able to absorb our lapses and misfortunes, and in the process get beyond them — and grow up a little.

“Learning from experience enables us to recognize when we need new behaviors, skills or attitudes. Failure of any kind also provides the energy we need to acquire the necessary learning to gain these new insights,” says Don Schutt, director of the University of Wisconsin–Madison Office of Human Resource Development. He also teaches an undergraduate leadership seminar in the Department of Sociology.

Without question, the ability to seek and discover useful meaning from undeserved tough breaks and even willful errors is a crucial element in the training and development of leaders.

One of these leaders may prove to be Joe Holm, a sophomore from Chippewa Falls, Wis. who enrolled in Schutt’s seminar last semester. Holm is a double major in religious studies and psychology. In addition, he is the site coordinator for the Wisconsin Union Directorate’s Alternative Breaks program, which organizes service travel packages for UW–Madison students. He also works in the campus chapters of Amnesty International; Play for Peace, which brings children and communities in conflict together for peaceful play; and the Integrated Liberal Studies program, a series of related courses for first- and second-year students.

Holm says his extracurricular activities reveal secrets about managing time and setting priorities.

“My first mistake at college was attempting to be as involved here as I was in high school. I quickly felt swamped and empty,” he says, adding that the emotional exhaustion he felt triggered an epiphany about his own psyche.

“I learned that I had to be passionate about the cause I was working for, or I wouldn’t be happy working for it,” Holm says. “Now, as a sophomore, I’m involved in nearly as many organizations as I was last year, but I feel passionate and excited about each of them. Working for them is a joy, rather than a burden.”

On the other hand, David Ngo. Ngo, who graduated in December with a bachelor’s degree in economics, says he made the opposite mistake, hanging back too much, at least at the beginning.

“I came to Madison from a smaller high school” — in Lancaster, Wis. — “where everyone pretty much knew each other. There were only 100 students in my class, and about 5,000 people in the entire town, so coming to Madison was a bit intimidating,” Ngo says.

“I thought to myself, I’ll just sit back and lay low, get used to the campus and new surroundings. I thought I’d worry about making friends later,” he says. “I lived in Sellery that first year. Living in the residence halls would have been a perfect way to meet new people, but instead I just crawled into a shell and shied away from other people. I just did school work, and I was often lonely. By the time I came out of my shell, most people had built the foundations of friendships, and I found myself on the outside.”

Ngo’s story has a happy ending, however. During sophomore year — “second semester,” he says ruefully — he was able to hook up with a group of good friends – without neglecting his studies. Degree now in hand, Ngo plans to work in Madison for a few years, and then pursue a master’s degree in business administration.

In contrast to Ngo’s wait-and-see approach, Schutt says that he has tried to control every last detail about each and every situation.

“I’ve learned through experience that, often, the more I try to control something, the less in control I actually am. That’s why the leadership seminar focuses less on a formula for leadership success and more on providing students with experiences, resources, tools and opportunities to challenge their own thinking and view of the world to engage more fully the context in which they live,” he says.

Holm’s life bears this out, specifically as it related to roommate selection. “In my first semester I had a roomie who was less than well-matched to my personality. Although it may seem like I merely ran away from the problem by moving out on him, I was able to learn a lot from that experience, most notably that everything needs to be put into perspective.

“I realize now that I overdramatized small incidents and conflicts,” Holm says. “My second roommate probably was no better suited to my personality than the first, but I managed to have a very pleasant semester with him due to my more relaxed attitude. If he didn’t water the plants, I saw that as a tiny problem rather than a drastic event that would alter the course of the year. So small problems remained small, or, on good days, not even a problem at all,” Holm says.

In addition to lofty “life lessons,” dead ends also can provide practical tools for negotiating the world and/or a particular field of study. Tracy Hirigoyen has had a number of occasions to reflect on decisions made in haste throughout the course of her undergraduate career. A native of St. Paul, Hirigoyen will graduate this spring with a degree in journalism and will be looking for work on a daily newspaper. Although now she feels on track about her education and major, that wasn’t always the case.

“I wasn’t really prepared to apply to colleges — I loved high school and didn’t want it to end,” she recalls. “My mother lobbied for me to go to UW–Madison, but I wound up spending my first semester at Loyola in Chicago. It’s a commuter school and I lived in a residence hall. It didn’t work for me — I only stayed one semester and then transferred here,” she says.

Once at UW–Madison, it took her a while longer to settle on the right major. “I had it in my mind that I was going to be pre-med. I ignored the fact that I’m a good writer. Plus, my father is in public relations, but I didn’t want to consider what he did. I learned I have to keep an open mind about things, and also to listen to myself, and trust my interests and abilities,” she says.

Indeed, the advising offices in all UW–Madison’s academic colleges and schools are crammed with students who realized they had made a significant mistake in declaring a particular major when another one would have cued up more precisely with their inclinations and talents. The Office of Budget, Planning and Analysis estimates that at least 25 percent of undergraduates declare a major only to switch to another one later.

The College of Letters and Science Cross-College Advising Service devotes its efforts expressly to students who have yet to decide on a major, “and that’s most students,” at least in the first few semesters, says CCAS advisor Stacie Haen-Darden. “A lot of the students I talk to change majors four or five times – they think they’d like to major in engineering, and then they take that first calculus class …”

In addition to its academic advisers, the CCAS recently added career advisers to help beginning students put possible majors into professional perspective. However, Hirigoyen believes it’s better not to dwell too much on the employment potential of academic majors.

“Choose a major based on what you enjoy, not with an eye toward how you’re going to make a living,” she advises.

Adds Joe Holm, “My most important classes are the ones I love. They put me more at ease with my college experience, and that carries into my daily life and interpersonal relationships.”

Ultimately, it is one of higher education’s primary missions to prepare undergraduate students for their adult lives, in both the world of work and as citizens of the world. Holm says he’s making great progress in those areas. “I hope what I’m learning will carry me through the rest of my life,” he says. “That may sound a little idealistic, but I think idealism is a great place to start.”