The Importance Of Social Capital In A University Student

According to Bourdieu and Wacquant (1992), social capital refers to the capacity of an individual to obtain actual or virtual benefits by virtue of one’s social networks. Social capital plays a vital role in human daily life because it helps individuals act more efficiently in many aspects. To my personal experience, different kinds of social capital, mainly bonding and bridging capital, had made great contribution for me to become a university student.

First of all, for bonding capital, several fellow schoolmates in my associate degree education provided me great encouragement and good learning atmosphere, which strengthened my confidence and determination in pursuing an offer in a tertiary institution. Bonding capital is social ties in one’s

Similarly, we all hate and are afraid of ‘free-riders’. Within that two-year school life, we registered the same courses, stayed along for doing group projects and revising learning materials, and even spent leisure time together. We shared our happiness and sadness as well. Based on emotional closeness, similarities in interest and backgrounds, bonding capital was created in our companionship. Under frequent contact, we established high intimacy and became close friends, thus strong tie founded among us. They were my great study partners in HKCC and really supportive on my path of entering into tertiary education. I felt lonely and frustrated because most of my secondary school classmates were successfully got a place in universities and only I was fell behind. I worried that it was time-wasting and worthless to have associate degree education if I failed to enroll into advanced education. However, my comrades understood my situation and they gave me a strong emotional support, which allowed me to develop a sense of belonging with them and motivated me to spare no pain in study for better GPA. As I remember, we became good friends after the first-time cooperation in a group project. We had comfortable

Bridging capital refers to the heterogeneous relationships with respect and mutuality between people who are not personally close (Woolcock, 2000). Lecturers are only responsible to deliver lessons to students but not necessary to provide advice for students’ education prospect; moreover, they need to teach large-size classes, it might be possible for them to recognize the students’ face but difficult to remember all the names. As the relationship between teachers and I was not in a similar situation, it would be recognized as bridging capital. The connection between those lecturers and I was infrequently maintained and non-intimate, a weak tie in teacher-student relationship existed. Although our relationship was not very close, the lecturers were willing to write reference letters for my Non-JUPAS admission when I asked them for help. They also contacted those graduates who had successfully entered into tertiary colleges to share their own interview experiences in different universities. The bridging capital provided useful information and extra resources for my better preparation of Non-JUPAS admission. I believed that those lecturers offered assistance to me based on generalized trust. Since they agree that ‘chance favors the prepared mind’, they are enthusiastic to offer