Your Sophomore Year Goal-Setting Workshop

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No longer a freshman, and no longer the least experienced person on your college campus, you no doubt returned to campus with more confidence and less anxiety than you did last fall. Nevertheless, you face a significant challenge as you start your sophomore year.

By your sophomore year, the expectation is that you will have determined at least a general direction for your studies from all that exploration. Indeed, for some majors, particularly those in the hard sciences, you need to start knocking down requirements and prerequisites by the fall of sophomore year, as many of these re­quirements, such as physics, organic chemistry, and physical chemistry, are full-year courses.

Now, it's time to se some new goals for the coming year to follow up on what you've already learned about yourself and your wants and needs.

We've divided the workshop into six categories: (1) academic and ca­reer goals, (2) social goals, (3) extracurricular goals, (4) physical goals, (5) financial goals, and (6) spiritual goals.

Your Sophomore Year Academic And Career Goals

So what did you learn about yourself academically last year?

What courses did you take and love, and what classes did you have trouble dragging yourself to attend every time? What distinctions can you draw from those experiences? Did you love your large lecture classes or hate them? Or did your enjoyment depend on the subject area or the professor? What introductory courses or subjects did you enjoy that you might want to explore more intensively? Did you hear about any other subjects that your roommates or friends explored that you might want to check out?

This is the semester when you really ought to be thinking about choosing a major. Are you there yet? If not, think about which courses and subjects really moved you last year. Were you engaged by your political science class, but utterly uninterested in your philosophy class? Fascinated by psychology, but bored by economics? In love with a foreign language and desperate to explore more about it and its affiliated culture? What courses were you excited to read for, and what were the classes you didn't want to miss? Draw every distinction you can from your experiences last year, and write them down. Worry about the practical application later. Let's try and find your passion!

Your Sophomore Year Social Goals

Did you spread your wings and "become you" last year? Who was it that emerged from the cocoon of high school or prep school and burst on to the college scene as a freshman?

What did you learn about yourself? And what do you still need to work on socially? Are you as confident as you want to be? Did you express yourself? Did you learn to be a good listener?

Did you find a good group of friends? Did you meet the people you wanted to meet? Did you get out enough, or did you go overboard and go out too much? Do you want to set any new goals or ground rules for your social interactions on campus this year? Did your social life swallow your academic life, such that you need to rein it in this year and get serious about your studies? Or did you spend too much time in the library and not meet as many people as you had hoped to meet? Remember that success in college is about balance. Do you need to work on maintaining a proper balance?