Let’s get real with the Google Calendar craze at UC Berkeley; it’s become our lives, and not in a good way.
Every semester at Cal starts the same. The campus is teeming with students, Sproul Plaza fills with club tables, and flyers get shoved into our hands promising free food, career opportunities, and networking extravaganzas. Club rush and recruitment season is exciting but, to put it simply, overwhelming. How do you balance classes, club meetings, coffee chats, interviews, and maybe even a social life? For many students, the answer lies in Google Calendar.
At a school where opportunities multiply by the minute, it’s easy to overcommit. One week you’re signing interest forms for ten student orgs, and the next you’re double-booked between an info session and office hours. Google Calendar acts as a buffer between you and that chaos. Rather than mentally juggling commitments, you can see them laid out in color-coded blocks. On top of that, if you’ve spent any time at Berkeley, you’ve probably heard the campus slang, “send me a bCal.” Whether you’re scheduling a study session, a club social, or just boba with friends, the default response is to pull up Google Calendar (or, more specifically, your bCal) and schedule your time into someone’s week.Â
On top of that, we use Google Calendar for more than organization. Psychologists talk about “decision fatigue” or the stress that comes from making too many choices. Offloading your mental to-do list into an external tracker reduces that stress. Instead of asking yourself, “what am I supposed to be doing right now?” you can glance at your calendar to avoid constantly negotiating your time. But at some point, the scheduling craze reaches an extreme of taking over your day, especially when even downtime gets planned. In campus culture, where busyness can feel like a badge of honor, blocking out “do nothing” hours on bCal signals a semblance of balance and deserves a highlighted spot on the calendar. Yet, is the way that time gets spent legitimate?
Yes, my days are organized. Yes, every minute is optimized. But, personally, some of the best parts of college are the unplanned moments. When every hour is slotted into neat, color-coded rectangles, it leaves little room for spontaneity. I’ve fallen into the micromanagement trap myself. When everyone’s schedules are stacked, sudden invites for late-night food get responded to with a “send me a bCal,” which means meeting with your friend… in two weeks.Â
In a community where social interaction, instead of flowing naturally, gets reduced to blocks, it can make time at Berkeley feel transactional. Especially in recruitment and club culture, coffee chats, instead of revolving around genuine conversations, can feel like networking for information, clout, or opportunity. When every moment of a day gets penciled in, our worth can feel measured by whether or not all our time is used doing something.
“When every moment of a day gets penciled in, our worth can feel measured by whether or not all our time is used doing something.”
Nora Yang
This is not to say that I believe Google Calendar is overrated; I check mine at least every hour. However, it has shaped the culture of how we value, share, and protect our time. Our calendars should be a tool for balance in our day-to-day lives, and in a place like Berkeley, where opportunity and overwhelm go hand in hand, that balance is everything. Perhaps making bCal a space for living well in an unplanned form is a conversation that the Berkeley community, and myself, need to block in more time for.