Exploring the world - part of a whole article

I'm a beginner writer. I want someone to help me improve only the grammar of this short part of my whole article. :)

.Sometimes, you learn not academically but by taking risks. So, there is a lot to learn outside the campus if only you venture new and totally different things.

Sometimes, you learn not by academically but by taking risks(not parallel; I want to add some ideas to rectify this sentence grammatically but I do not have any idea what your topic is all about.)

So, there is a lot to learn outside the campus if only you venture new and totally different things. (Why did you use "so"? It seems inappropriate considering the idea in your preceding sentence.)

There are valuable things to be learned outside the campus, so all you have to do is to venture and get involved.