Oh, high school. It doesn’t seem so long ago that you were sitting in your first period class freshman year of high school. Graduation seemed a lifetime away. You were happy. You didn’t have bags under your eyes. You weren’t living off ramen noodles, and you felt like you were on top of the world. At least you did for a sweet, short time before you realized you were the low man on the totem pole. You stuck it out, though, and finally, after proms, cheesy pep rallies, hideous license pictures, first heart breaks, best friend fights, teachers who were out to get you and some pretty awful fashion trends, you tossed that tassel in the air. Now here you are, in college, and if you're anything like me, you ask yourself about a hundred times a day, "Why didn’t they teach me this in high school?" Because, again, if you're anything like me, you feel unprepared for virtually everything life throws at you about a hundred times a day as well. Well, guess what, guys, class is in session. Ready for a little Life 101? Here’s a crash course in a few of the many things we should have been learning in high school while they were “preparing” us for college.

1. Finals

Perhaps the last thing on my mind in high school was finals. They were only worth a small percentage of your grade, and they were usually just unit tests over what you had been covering for that week. Half the time, we didn’t even have to take them. At my high school, you could even exempt yourself if you got good enough grades. Your teachers were nice, and they'd calculate your grades for you to let you know that literally all you had to do to keep an A in the class was put your name on the paper. So, as I am sure you have all experienced at least once in your college career as well, you can imagine my surprise when I got the study guide for my first college course. The study guide looked a little something like this: Name:________ 1. Read chapters 1-15. It might as well have said, You're about to have your brain run over by a car, because that’s pretty much how it felt. It only got worse as the years went on, and as a junior, I'm only half,way through so I can only imagine how bad they are going to get. In the dead of summer, the word "cumulative" still sends a shiver down my spine. And then there are midterms, which they might as well call finals 2.0. I cried, I stress-ate, I cried some more, I all but set up a tent in the library, but somehow I got through it, no thanks to you, high school.

2. Being Broke

As a future educator of America, I promise that one day when I have a bunch of hormonal, sassy high schoolers sitting in front of me, probably imagining setting me on fire for assigning research papers or making them read Shakespeare, I will teach them the important things in life. Like couponing and viciously raiding the clearance aisle. I'll teach them how to talk themselves down off the “I have to buy that dress or I am going to die” ledge and save their money. I'll tell them about this magical land called The Dollar Store, then make sure I fully educate them by telling them the ins and outs of dollar store shopping. Example: Dollar store garbage bags and notebooks are OK, but dollar store dairy and meat products...a little suspicious. They will write the definition of “student discount” down the fronts and backs of crumpled notebook pages so they remember. And one day when they realize I'm actually not Satan in the body of a small redheaded woman with a million freckles, they’ll thank me. See, I'm awesome at this teaching thing. They might as well just give me my diploma already.

3. Handling Stress

I know for a fact that I speak for every college kid in the nation when I say that, as a college student with pretty good grades, a decent social life, a job and commitments to multiple organizations, I have never been so stressed out in my life. I'm not even going to act like I handle that stress well either, but that is a-OK because I could name about a million friends off the top of my head who also don’t handle the stress well (all of them). Assuming and praying that my friends and I aren’t the only crazy ones out there, I know everyone else is in the same boat as me. This is crunch time. It's our training to be adults while being expected to live like and act like an adult as well. These grades get us a job that is intended to provide for us and our families for the rest of our lives... You get my point. There is no room for messing up now. I've tried working out, yoga, sleeping, binge watching Netflix, sobbing on the phone to my mom at 3 a.m. — nothing takes the stress away. It's good to be a little stressed. It means you care about this important time in your life, but often, it becomes way too much. I'll give it to high school. There’s not much you can do to prepare for this hectic time in our lives, but a little warning sure would have been nice.

4. Moving

Moving away from home for the first time can be really stressful, especially when your new home is a nasty res hall that probably has communal bathrooms older than your parents and a scary new person who is going to sleep less than two feet away from you every night for the next year. From the little things, like the inconvenience of having to find a new favorite restaurant and having no clue what to pack, to the bigger things, like missing your family and being left out of important events in their lives, moving can totally suck. And it’s a lot harder than you had ever imagined. You have to learn how to cook, clean after yourself, get yourself everywhere you need to be on your own, a million other things. Then there's learning the things you never even thought about having to learn. How do I get this stain out? What's my bank routing number? What do you ask when you have to go to the doctor alone? It's hard to realize how much the people at home do for you until home isn’t your home anymore. Luckily, it never takes long to settle back in and before you know it, you'll be crying that you have to leave this dingy old college town. Plus your newfound independence to do whatever you want whenever you want (OK, maybe not anything you want) is a huge bonus and the friends you make along the way provide you with a new family. The old saying, “college makes you appreciate home and home makes you appreciate college,” definitely hits the nail on the head.

5. Relationships

College changes every single relationship you have. It changes your relationship with your family, your friends back home, your new friends, boyfriends, girlfriends and, if you're Greek, your sisters or brothers. Every relationship you’ve ever had either becomes mature or ceases to exist as you grow. You begin to realize Mom and Dad's rules aren’t so stupid and probably even swear your kids will have stricter ones. You realize which hometown friends mean enough to carry along on the ride with you and which ones you need to cut the cord with. Your new friends become the people you turn to for everything. Instead of your mom, they're the ones you call to beg for medicine at 3 a.m. when you're sick. They're the ones who pat you on the back when you get a good grade, and they're the ones who give you a firm talking to when it's needed. Boyfriends and girlfriends go from being fast and passionate flings to being people you think of having a future with, being a spouse, a parent and a lifetime partner through the good and the bad. And your Greek brothers or sisters? I won't even try to explain that relationship because it’s the most complicated, frustrating, rewarding and beautiful relationship you could have probably never imagined for yourself.

While college can be a crazy ride, and it sure would be nice to have an instruction manual, there is truly nothing that prepares you for the experience other than giving it all the good ol’ college try. The reason high school doesn’t prepare you for these things and many others is that high school can't prepare you for these challenging and rewarding experiences. Your teen years leave you incapable of fathoming the thought that a test could determine your future, that one day your mom isn’t going to do everything for you, that one day you're probably going to get married and have kids. These are things that only growing and maturing can prepare you for. It’s a crazy ride, all right, but it’s the ride of a lifetime.