All throughout high school we’ve heard teachers and parents telling us that college would be “worse” and “so much more work” than high school. Everyone always made comments that high school was so much easier than college and tell us that we would miss high school “soooo” much once we had a taste of college.
After successfully completing my first year of college, I can now say that all of those people were wrong. College is a lot better than high school in so many ways, I do not miss those high school days, and I would never give up my current days in college to go back to seven hours a day in a building with not enough air and too much judgment.
Here are six ways that college is so much better than high school:
1. Much more free time in college.
We started our days around 7 a.m. not getting out of classes until 3 p.m. By the time extracurriculars, after-school jobs, homework, and dinner were over it was already time for bed. This left no time for relaxation or fun. In college your schedule is much more spread out and controllable. On top of this, your whole day of classes and work only lasts about five to six hours instead of 10-12. This leaves a lot more time for catching up on work, watching Netflix, or hanging out with friends.
3. Less classes in one day.
While a college schedule still consists of five to six classes, these classes are spread throughout an entire week instead of all crammed into one day. In high school we spent five days a week sitting in six or more classes back to back to back. During my first year of college I never experienced having more than three classes in one day. While there is a lot of work for each of these classes, it makes the day a lot shorter and more bearable than in high school.
4. Not having to ask to use the bathroom.
This may seem like a small thing but it actually makes a big difference. Once you start doing this it’s hard to even imagine that there was a time you actually had to ask to do an unavoidable and natural necessity.
5. Missing class isn’t as big of a deal.
While you are normally only given a certain number of allowed absences from each class depending on the professor, it’s much easier to catch up on missed work. Unlike high school where if you were sick or needed a mental health day, you had to miss all eight classes, talk to each teacher, and ask friends from each class to catch up on the mountains of work that you missed. In college, if you feel sick and need to miss your 8:30 a.m. class, you can still make it to the 2 p.m. one. Or, if you need a mental health day of watching Netflix and eating junk food with your best friend, you only miss a few classes and have at least two days to catch up on the missed work.
6. No “cool” group.
In high school, you face judgment for everything. The color of your hair, the person you’re dating, the grades you get. It seems never-ending to be made fun of for choosing not to drink or smoke. If the popular kids don’t like you from day one, it’s basically a social death sentence for the next four years. Beginning college completely dissolves all of this. No one is the “cool crowd.” There are so many different types of people and groups that it is very hard not to fit in with at least some of them. Of course there will be judgmental people no matter where you go and how old you get, but college provides you with many options of friends so that you always have people on your side and friendly faces to turn to.
While high was not all bad, I'm pretty sure we can all agree that the freedom, happiness, and fun that college provides us is much more satisfying. Saying goodbye to football games, prom, and the small hallways we grew up in seemed sad at first but it was soon upgraded to the professors, parties, and roommates that we now can't imagine our lives without.
