By Qianyu (Margaret Cheng)
Hey everyone! Ready for the next post? Today’s post is about the importance of reading your e-mail. Have you ever deleted a super long e-mail without glancing at it? I did it all the time since I did not have the patience to read through all the text. However, even the seemingly most boring e-mail might have hidden treasure, and it is really a life skill for me, a college international student, to find out about resources and events on campus, academic news and opportunities, and much more.
Here are several categories of e-mails I have been receiving and found extremely helpful to our everyday life.
The first category is the notification about academics. It’s usually sent by professors or group member to inform you about the progress of courses. I got the advising note from my department director every semester so that I can know what courses are being provided next semester and how can I make most out of it. Also, when I am doing group project with my group members and classmates, the main mediation we use is e-mail. With group e-mail, it is easier to know what everyone else is doing and thinking about. Also, it is really important to respond to e-mail as soon as possible because the other members may be waiting for the responses. It is also a way to show the professionalism. As a result, these e-mails are so important that it might be the first thing to read in mailbox.
Additionally, informational e-mail is a typical kind of e-mail we get either from ISSS or your department or club. For instance, ISSS newsletter, Actuarial Science Club newsletter and LAS newsletter are these kinds of e-mails that I received most often. There is so much invaluable information in E-mails so it is like a adventure to dig into them and find the treasure. Even it may takes a long time, I will read through the informational e-mails every time. University position application, interesting and beneficial events and great resources, these are all on e-mails. When I find them, I will add the deadline of application as well as events dates on my calendar or I-Book. Then when I check the schedule for tomorrow or next week, I can keep track of what is going on and grab every opportunity to get more involved in extracurricular activities. I became an International Student Orientation Leader in my freshman year in fall, and I found out this opportunity in newsletter of ISSS.
Also, here are some tips about how to manage the e-mails and scan the content. Every time when I receive e-mail, I will include it in different labels as well. Label like “JAPAN 201” to collect all the e-mails about the class JAPAN 201, or “BLOG” to put the e-mails all about blogs. So in this way, when I want to take a look at all my e-mails under this category, it is fairly easy and I did not need to search for it in my mailbox for a whole day. Also, scan the content is an important skill to learn especially when you are short of time and e-mail is still fairly long. You can tell what the content is about from title the most of the time, so you can choose which one to read first and what to read next. Sometimes in the informational e-mail there are tons of information, but the main ideas will be formatted using bigger or bolded words or pictures, in that way you can skip the part that you are not interested and focus more on more important content.
It is really a life skill to read your e-mail, and it is a main method for me to get involved and get to know the information that’s available. Sometimes during workday we might get tons of e-mails and it might seem overwhelming, but if you take time to dig through them, you will find treasure and make most of your college study abroad experience.
Thank you and see you next week!