The Phase When Everyone Suddenly Joins a Committee

There is a specific moment in every Pune college calendar when campus energy shifts almost overnight. WhatsApp groups multiply. Google Forms circulate aggressively. Conversations in corridors revolve around interviews, selections, and positions. Students who were barely visible a month ago suddenly introduce themselves as coordinators, volunteers, or core members of something.

This is the phase when everyone seems to join a committee.

It happens predictably, yet it always feels sudden. One week, college life looks routine. Lectures, attendance anxiety, quiet canteen lunches. The next week, students are staying back after hours, carrying files, arguing about permissions, and learning how to sound busy. For juniors especially, this phase feels important, urgent, and slightly overwhelming.

But beyond the surface excitement, committee culture reveals a lot about how belonging, ambition, and pressure operate in college life.

Why the Committee Phase Feels Unavoidable

For many students, joining a committee does not start as a choice. It starts as a feeling. The feeling that if you do not sign up now, you will be left behind.

In Pune colleges, committees are presented as gateways. Gateways to exposure, to networks, to confidence, to being known. Seniors talk about how committees changed their college experience. Faculty mention them during lectures. Social media posts celebrate committee teams after every successful event.

This creates an atmosphere where non participation feels like a risk. Students worry that opting out means missing something essential. Even those who are unsure find themselves filling forms just in case.

The committee phase thrives on this collective momentum. When everyone around you is joining, staying out feels like an active decision rather than a neutral one.

The Promise of Identity in a Crowded Campus

College life can feel anonymous, especially in large institutions. Committees offer something powerful. A title.

Being part of a committee gives students a label that travels faster than their name. Cultural team. Tech team. Management team. These identities create instant recognition.

For students who feel invisible in classrooms, committees provide visibility. Wearing an ID card, being part of official meetings, or simply being called for work creates a sense of importance. It signals that you matter somewhere.

This is particularly appealing in the first and second year, when students are still figuring out who they are in the college ecosystem.

How Ambition Quietly Drives Participation

Not every student joins committees for connection. For some, the motivation is strategic.

Committees are seen as steps toward leadership, recommendations, and future opportunities. In Pune, where internships and exposure matter early, students begin building profiles sooner than expected.

Joining a committee becomes a way to demonstrate involvement. To show initiative. To avoid gaps in one’s college narrative.

This ambition is rarely framed as pressure, but it often is. Students join committees even when they are already stretched, convincing themselves that busyness equals growth.

The Rush of Early Involvement

The first few weeks of committee work feel exciting. Meetings are frequent. Plans are ambitious. Everyone is eager to contribute.

Students stay back after college, sometimes for the first time. They learn how events are planned, how permissions are taken, how chaos is managed. There is satisfaction in being trusted with responsibility, even small tasks.

Friendships form quickly during this phase. Shared stress and late hours accelerate bonding. For many students, these early committee days become some of their fondest memories.

At this stage, fatigue is invisible. Adrenaline carries everyone forward.

When Reality Begins to Set In

As weeks pass, the shine dulls slightly. Work becomes repetitive. Attendance expectations remain unchanged. Academic deadlines pile up.

Students begin to realize that committees demand consistency, not just enthusiasm. Meetings clash with lectures. Tasks spill into weekends. Recognition is uneven.

This is often the moment when students start questioning their decision. The same committee that once felt exciting now feels demanding.

But leaving feels complicated. Quitting can feel like failure. Students worry about how it will be perceived by seniors or peers.

The Hierarchy Nobody Explains Upfront

One truth about committees that students discover slowly is hierarchy.

Not all members are equal. Decision making power rests with a few. Others execute without much say. Visibility varies dramatically depending on role and proximity to leadership.

This hierarchy is not always intentional, but it is very real. Seniors rely on trusted members. Familiar faces get opportunities. Newer members often do background work.

Understanding this takes time. Many students initially assume effort alone will lead to growth. When it does not, frustration builds quietly.

Overcommitment Becomes Normalised

One of the most striking aspects of the committee phase is how easily overcommitment becomes acceptable.

Students join multiple committees, fearing that one is not enough. They juggle roles across cultural, technical, and departmental spaces. Being constantly busy becomes a badge of honour.

In Pune colleges, where comparison is constant, this busyness is often visible. Students talk about how little they sleep. How packed their schedules are.

Rarely does anyone ask whether this is sustainable. Burnout is treated as part of the process rather than a warning sign.

The Silent Exits No One Talks About

Not everyone stays till the end of the year. Some students stop attending meetings gradually. Others step back after major events.

These exits are usually quiet. Explained away as academic pressure or personal reasons. Rarely acknowledged openly.

Yet these departures are common. They reflect a recalibration. Students reassess what they want from college and what they can realistically handle.

Leaving a committee is not always a rejection of the experience. Often, it is an honest response to misalignment.

What Committees Teach Beyond Resumes

Despite their flaws, committees teach lessons that classrooms often do not.

Students learn how systems function. How decisions are delayed. How communication breaks down. How teamwork is messy.

They experience leadership up close, both good and bad. They learn how authority feels when exercised and when challenged.

These lessons stay with students long after college. Even those who leave early carry insights about boundaries, collaboration, and self awareness.

The Phase Ends, But Its Impact Remains

Eventually, the committee phase settles. Students either find their rhythm or step away. The urgency fades. College life finds a new balance.

Looking back, many students realise that joining a committee was less about the role and more about the phase itself. A phase of trying, belonging, testing limits.

Not everyone needed to join. Not everyone needed to stay. But almost everyone needed to understand what it felt like.

In Pune college life, committees are not just organisational units. They are rites of passage. They reveal how students respond to opportunity, pressure, and expectation.

And when the next batch arrives, the cycle repeats. Forms circulate. Groups buzz. And somewhere on campus, a student hesitates, wondering whether to click submit, sensing that this moment, however confusing, is part of becoming a college student.