From STEM to St. Stephen’s: A First-Timer's Adventure in DU's Heartland

When I was in 10th standard, I had a hard decision to make - Science or Commerce? A decision that was to shape the next 10 years of my life. While I was inclined towards taking science because of how much I enjoyed STEM, there was a part of me that was inclined towards living my student life as a DU student and taking commerce. Though I went ahead with taking science and joined an engineering college, In my final year I got a taste of this DU life while participating in a coding event. Read ahead as I take you down the streets of the north campus.

My stereotypical lens has seen DU as a place where you can find students singing, dancing, acting, rallying, protesting, literally anything but studying. Compare that to the image of engineering colleges, students running from class to lab to meet that minimum 70% attendance criteria and studying day and night before exams. It’s a parallel universe in many scenarios. So when I joined my engineering college I had this goal of experiencing this DU student life for once. I had heard from my commerce friends about North Campus - which is home to many different DU colleges. Of all these, a few colleges that stood out to me were SRCC and St. Stephen’s - because of their roof-touching acceptance criteria, selecting only the top 0.1% of students. If I were to ever go to a DU college, it has to be either one of them. Now I am a bit socially awkward person, so going to these colleges during a fest night was a no-go for me. Months passed by waiting for the right opportunity. On one fine day, the raven at unstop delivered me an opportunity that I couldn’t miss - Code-a-thon 2023. It was a coding competition organized by the Computer Science Society of St Stephen’s College. Considering that my 3 am thoughts are still not worthy of a TEDx talk, I would not have gotten a better opportunity to explore the campus of St. Stephen’s than this. Knowing that the famous Bollywood film - Rockstar was shot on this campus, added to my excitement about visiting this college. Code-a-thon was divided into 2 rounds. An online round which comprised MCQs followed by an offline coding round where the task was to solve challenging coding problems under time constraints. An event like this is very common on any engineering campus, but the fact that it was being organized inside a DU college made things more interesting for me. With the intention of networking with new individuals, I registered for the opportunity and made it to the offline round.

While I tried to bribe my friends with some momos to accompany me to this college for the offline round, the red chutney spiced things up against me. St. Stephens. is also popular for its strict entry policy regarding outsiders which made sure I was alone on this journey. I was very excited as this was my first time exploring the north campus. The moment you come out of Vishwavidyalaya metro station - there’s this constant chanting of e-rickshaw drivers announcing that you have made it to the hub of all the colleges. The college was roughly 20 minutes walking from the metro station. I went all in and decided to walk to the venue instead of taking an e-rickshaw. Walking past lavish bungalows I was accompanied by an army of monkeys, swinging down the street with me. While I was walking down I was just hoping that none of these cute yet terrifying animals attack me. It also made me wonder how DUites tolerate them daily. What was supposed to be a 20-minute walk ended into a 30-minute stroll with me stopping in between, observing a little monkey casually eating chips after tearing a packet. Unlike some humans, this one went ahead and threw the wrapper in a dustbin (I wish I recorded that 😭).

Finally, I made it to the iconic road from where St. Stephen’s looks the most magnificent. To the disappointment of my fellow Instagrammers, It is constantly guarded to prevent people from clicking photos of the building. I am not sure why. Then I make my way into the campus through the main gate. There I met some fellow participants as we waited for the event coordinator to guide us to the event venue. The lush green campus of the college, with all different kinds of birds chirping welcomed us inside it by showing us the way through these blend of gothic and colonial styled buildings. We passed by some classrooms and to my surprise students were studying inside them. Apart from that the atmosphere was everything that I had dreamt of in a college - a few students casually dancing to the tunes of melodious music, others having their jamming session. The cherry on top is the theatre kids trying to perfect their storytelling. What makes this college stand out is the international students that it attracts for some of its courses. While I have worked with people across the globe in the past, I have always wondered about the impact such exposure can have on your personal growth. it surely resembles an experience of studying abroad in terms of having a diverse peer circle.

Inside the event, I was networking with fellow participants while the event organizers were busy with last-moment preparations. Being a final-year student, I felt nostalgic interacting with my juniors, hearing them rant about their academic pressure and tense about their future placements. After talking to a bunch of enthusiastic folks about the latest technology trends I realized a thing. Though we were not pursuing the same course, we shared the same spark towards technology. The room was filled with discussions about various programming languages to the use of AI tools in our day-to-day lives. This shows that technology knows no boundaries. Seeing the up-to-date computing resources in their labs also shows their college authorities' commitment to upskilling their students in emerging technologies. My day was made when I met a fellow participant who was currently in his first year, pursuing a Bachelor of Sciences in Physics from DU. His interest in quantum computing and his ultimate goal of becoming a part of the CERN lab stood out to me. It is my biased take, but there’s an engineer hidden in all of us.

Post the event we had some complimentary snacks and went for a stroll around the campus. On my way out, I met an event coordinator. As we walked back home talking about the changing placements scenario for the current batch, I got some scoop about their most popular tea stall - “Sudama Ki Chai” and the reason behind its over-the-roof success (☘🤫). This was when our paths diverged and I decided to take an e-rickshaw for my remaining journey to the metro station. The final thing on my checklist was fulfilled as I crossed a group of protesting students.

If someone were to color-code the life of a DU student, I am sure the result would be a broad spectrum of colors. There is so much it has to offer. At the end of the day, the choice is yours whether you plan to soak yourself in the brights or indulge yourself in the darker shades. I went back home, having crossed another item from my goals list. While my phone’s gallery was full of aesthetics of the north campus, my heart was filled with the wholesome experiences I had throughout the day. While winning or losing one thing, what matters to me the most is the learning that comes from the process. I was delighted to meet so many new people and learn about their unique experiences. The engineer inside me became more appreciative of the different mindsets others can bring to the table. The 10th-grader inside of me broke the stereotypical lens it had formed about the life of a DU student. Oh did I also mention that I clinched the second prize in the event? If you feel like congratulating me, feel free to do so by giving a heart to this article. Have something more to add about the DU student life? Drop them in the comments. I would love to read them.