A semester’s end signifies many things. For some students, it represents a distressing time when they realize they should have tried a little harder in some of their classes. Other students may see the benefits of those long study sessions reflected in their final grades. Then, there are many students who just think the end of a semester is the beginning of a break from school.

While a semester’s end may mean different things to different students, what it should not represent is the end of learning. Students should take advantage of the month they have off from school and seek out knowledge they wanted to find but did not have enough time and/or energy to pursue during the semester.

For instance, a student studying engineering may have had a sudden urge halfway through the semester to learn how to paint using watercolor paints. Unfortunately, between classes, homework and a part-time job, that student did not have time to pick up a paintbrush or even read a book about watercolor painting.

Winter Break offers that engineering student time to pursue something he or she did not have time to pursue when school was in session. If that student finds he or she does not like watercolor painting, he or she can move on to another topic or activity of interest, without the penalty of poor grades or having to drop a class.

Essentially, Winter Break gives students the freedom to study whatever they desire, and students should use that opportunity to really delve into their passions. In the words of American theoretical physicist Richard Feynman, “Study hard what interests you the most in the most undisciplined, irreverent and original manner possible.”

With that said, students do have the freedom during the semester to choose classes based on their interests. However, students often cannot decide what they are taught by their professors. They cannot write their professors’ syllabi to include all the knowledge they want to be taught.

During Winter Break, students can make their own syllabi that include all the knowledge they want to learn and all the activities they want to try. If they become unsatisfied with their syllabi, they can change them to accommodate what or how they want to learn.

However, in order to make an effective syllabus, a student must be truly passionate to learn about what is on that syllabus. There will be no teacher to make sure the student is actually making strides to learn.

The desire to learn must be the core motivator in following the syllabus, as it should be during the school year too. However, while school is in session, some students forget that and get caught up in attending college merely to obtain degrees, which will then get them jobs.

Students should let Winter Break be the time when they reinvigorate their pursuits in learning about topics for which they are passionate.

In doing such, students will take their learning into their own hands and will realize, in the words of Abigail Adams, “Learning is not attained by chance; it must be sought for with ardor and attended to with diligence.”