Is university clubbing overrated?

A 19-year-old boy goes to university, filled with hundreds of dreams, fantasies, and curiosity. On his first days, he roams around with curious eyes, looking to make friends, have fun, and develop himself. Suddenly, he finds all these offerings amidst the chaos, under the 'University Clubbing' banner.

What should he do? Is this investment of time and effort worthwhile? Are the lucrative promotional commitments true? Especially, is the club a family?

On the other hand, he starts to hear rumors of toxic politics, time waste and CGPA fall. At this point, most of the students make mistakes. They believe either the lucrative commitments or the negative rumors.

Here the question arises: Are these university clubs overrated?

One of the problems we have is we generalise everything. Everyone should be a doctor, and men must be engineers. Just like that, some people believe that everyone should join a club, while some believe that no one should.

Clubbing is not overrated. It is very essential. On the other hand, university clubbing is not for everyone. People should understand their needs, interests and career goals to decide whether they should join a university club.

• If you need a community, join the club. If you want to stay alone, prefer not to join.
• If you feel that you need to develop skills, join here. If you are already skilled enough, it’s optional.
• If you want to improve networking, you should join. If you already have a good network, you can have better choices.
• If you want to experiment with leadership practice with adaptability, it’s a good place. If you are not interested in people and leadership, prefer not to join.

However, blindly bringing one’s whole world into the club is harmful. Clubs can be a small part of one’s huge world. Also, like all communities, clubs have internal politics too. There are family politics, village politics, friend circle politics, etc around us. And club politics is discussed more because it has a hierarchy and power needs.

A club is never a family. But it’s a large community. Only smart people utilise this community in their lives and careers. A smart lifestyle and time management can balance club activity and CGPA. Clubbing will develop sincerity, responsibility, leadership capability, adaptivity, and strategy-making.

So, before joining a club, a student should consider all these benefits and drawbacks to ensure a healthy time in the club rather than a toxic one with overrated expectations.

The author is President, North South University Human Resources Club