{"id":23671,"date":"2015-03-17T09:48:19","date_gmt":"2015-03-17T13:48:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.studentlife.utoronto.ca\/lifeatuoft\/?p=23671"},"modified":"2015-03-17T09:48:19","modified_gmt":"2015-03-17T13:48:19","slug":"overcoming-my-fear-of-professors","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.studentlife.utoronto.ca\/lifeatuoft\/2015\/03\/17\/overcoming-my-fear-of-professors\/","title":{"rendered":"Overcoming my Fear of Professors"},"content":{"rendered":"

Up until last Thursday, I don\u2019t think I had ever actually seen a professor up close.\u00a0<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\r\n

I mean, sure, I\u2019ve sat front row in lecture or passed them while walking to class, but I am really bad at actually talking to my professors. I never bring my questions to them after class, or go to their office hours. I do all of these things with my TAs, but something about actually talking to a professor intimidates me.\u00a0<\/b><\/p>\r\n

I think that I\u2019m always worried I\u2019ll sound stupid, or that I won\u2019t have anything worth occupying their time with. <\/strong>When in reality, my philosophy professor would probably actually enjoy discussing Plato with me. I mean, isn\u2019t that kind of why you become a teacher? To teach<\/i>.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n

\"Photo<\/a>
Image via. http:\/\/www.news.utoronto.ca\/<\/figcaption><\/figure>\r\n

So when I was invited to the UCLit Coffee with the Profs: A Panel Discussion on Poverty and Homelessness<\/a>, I immediately thought no way!\u00a0<\/i><\/span><\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n

\"Poster<\/a>
Image via. www.facebook.com\/universitycollegelit<\/figcaption><\/figure>\r\n

What could I possibly bring to this discussion that one of the expert panelists couldn\u2019t say better? Do I even know anything about poverty and homelessness in Toronto? Do I even know ANYTHING AT ALL?!!?!!<\/span><\/p>\r\n

But doing things that are out of my comfort zone was one of my new school year resolutions, and has created most of my other content here on the blog<\/a>. I survived all those other awkward situations, so why not this one?<\/span><\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n

\"The<\/a>
The layout of the panel!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\r\n

Coffee with the Profs is a regular event held by the UCLit. Anyone can come, and each event has a different theme or topic.<\/strong> Some, like this one, are panel-style, while others are more of a social and networking event. The atmosphere is always casual - they order pizza and make a cozy corner of couches in the JCR - and there are UCLit reps scattered throughout the group to ask a question when things get awkward and silent.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n

The panel I attended was more of an informal round-table discussion than a panel, and included Professor Hulchanski from the Centre for Urban and Community studies, Poet Laureate George Elliot Clarke, and Jesse Surdigo from the Yonge Street Mission. Each guest brought a different perspective to the topic as they discussed questions such as; what is poverty, why is it so difficult to escape, and what can we be doing to help?\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n

\"Students<\/a>
A different Coffee with the Profs session held by the UClit photo via. www.facebook.com\/universitycollege<\/figcaption><\/figure>\r\n

I found that although I didn\u2019t have a wealth of knowledge on the subject, I was able to ask more specific questions about what was being discussed<\/strong> - rather than overarching philosophical ones. I actually ended up leaving the panel having formulated the beginning of my own opinion on the subject.<\/p>\r\n

I overcame my fear of feeling inadequate in the presence of professors, and learned some new things in the process. <\/strong>I even engaged in a bit of twitter-talk with Professor Hulchanski after the panel!\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n

\"Screen<\/a><\/p>\r\n

If you\u2019re nervous about talking to professors, I would definitely suggest hitting up one of these events! The informal setting makes it a lot easier to interact, or to just sit back and watch if that\u2019s what you\u2019re more comfortable with. I would also suggest going if you\u2019re particularly interested in one of the topics, as it\u2019s a great place to share your passion with other academics and students.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n

Congrats to the UClit on hosting such a great series of events! I can\u2019t wait to see what topics you bring up next!\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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\nUp until last Thursday, I don\u2019t think I had ever actually seen a professor up close.\u00a0 I mean, sure, I\u2019ve sat front row in lecture or passed them while walking to class, but I am really bad at actually talking…\n<\/div>
Continue reading “Overcoming my Fear of Professors”<\/span>…<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>
Continue reading “Overcoming my Fear of Professors”<\/span>…<\/a><\/div>","protected":false},"author":227,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[6669,59,65,60,1,70,69,66,6480,67,68],"tags":[5,13572,25499,25504,13571,25509,13578,13576,13573,13574,13575,248,9481,25507,267,237,13577,696,1317,9340,96],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.studentlife.utoronto.ca\/lifeatuoft\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23671"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.studentlife.utoronto.ca\/lifeatuoft\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.studentlife.utoronto.ca\/lifeatuoft\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.studentlife.utoronto.ca\/lifeatuoft\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/227"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.studentlife.utoronto.ca\/lifeatuoft\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23671"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.studentlife.utoronto.ca\/lifeatuoft\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23671\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":23767,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.studentlife.utoronto.ca\/lifeatuoft\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23671\/revisions\/23767"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.studentlife.utoronto.ca\/lifeatuoft\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23671"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.studentlife.utoronto.ca\/lifeatuoft\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23671"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.studentlife.utoronto.ca\/lifeatuoft\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23671"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}