Editorial: “˜Real world’ no place to forget college experiences

We’re told from the start of freshman year that there are
two phases to college life: college, and the “real
world.” There might be a difference between the two, but this
year’s graduating class shouldn’t be afraid to
intertwine them.

Graduates are entering a world that is fundamentally different
from the one they knew when they started college. Four years ago,
2,800 people were killed in the terrorism of Sept. 11, when this
country suffered the worst attack on its soil since World War
II.

President Bush and his administration have since catapulted the
United States into a war that has dominated national thinking
““ and cost the lives of over 1,800 U.S. soldiers so far.
Americans then recently re-elected that president by the margin of
Ohio, and the election revealed just how politically divided the
country has become.

At a more local level, a state economic downturn forced the
University of California to raise its fees for the first time in
seven years. Before spring 2003, in-state undergraduates paid
$3,834 in systemwide fees. By fall 2004, they were paying $5,684,
with no relief in sight. Graduate and out-of-state students have
been hit even harder. How’s that for incurring student
debt?

That economic nosedive ““ along with a number of other
problems ““ led the citizens of California to recall an
experienced but uncharismatic politician from the governor’s
office in 2003, and bring in a bodybuilder whose claim to fame was
portraying a killer robot on the silver screen. Worldwide fame
““ or infamy ““ for Californians followed.

Meanwhile, campus and college life rolled on. Students marched
and protested on the issues they wanted heard ““ most notably
in 2001, when over 1,000 students protested university policies
that prevented affirmative action, and in 2002, when over 1,000
students walked out of class to protest against the war in
Iraq.

Workers at the UCLA Willed Body Program thought they could make
some extra money by hacking up and selling body parts, unions went
on strike, minority student enrollment tumbled, Taco Bell left (but
now wants to move in again), and UCLA’s much-vaunted football
and men’s basketball programs went on hiatus.

There’s a lesson in each of these events ““ and
countless others that won’t fit into this editorial. And,
incredibly, none of those lessons occurred in a classroom.

Textbook knowledge is important, yes. And for some graduates, it
will be crucial to what they do with their lives. But the lessons
that aren’t in the books ““ and the people we became
while in college because of those lessons ““ are very real,
and shouldn’t be forgotten.

In 10 or 20 years, it might be easy to look back on those
college years and dismiss them as idealistic, unrealistic and
beyond compare. Maybe they are, but that doesn’t prevent them
from being transferred to the “real world.”

Being an alum means more than slapping that sticker or license
plate frame on the back of your car or putting that small Bruin
bear on your office desk. It means taking what you’ve done
and what you’ve experienced at UCLA and using it in a
worthwhile way.

UCLA graduates have gone on to do great things. They have become
mayors, CEOs, professional athletes, teachers, parents and
soldiers. This year’s graduating class will be no different.
Its members will all be successful, each in his or her own way.

But while they’re at it, they would do well to remember
who they were in college ““ what drove them, what moved them.
It would be an injustice to this school, to the college experience,
but most importantly to themselves, to forget that.