When I tell people that I went to community college before I went to a four year university, I get strange looks. I'm also asked why I didn't go away right after high school. I used to feel uncomfortable with being asked that question. It wasn't really any of their business as to why I decided to go away or not. It didn't effect them in any. But it also made me feel like I was being judged for it. Some people may have been judging me, but not everyone was. They just wanted to know why this path was what I decided to take in life.
There is nothing wrong with going to a community college before going away to a four year school. It took me until about my second year there to be okay with the fact that I didn't go to a big name school right off the bat. Everyone takes life differently. It's okay to go to a community college to see if going to a four year school is something you would want to do because in the end, college isn't for everyone.
You're saving money. This was one of the biggest things for me when I decided to go to community college. They tend to be a lot cheaper than the four year schools. I didn't need to take out any state loans for my time there. I was able to use only my federal aid to pay for my three years there. Four year schools are really expensive, even more so if you don't really know what you want to do with your life after college ends.
You may not have known exactly what you wanted to do. And that's okay, too. I wasn't totally sure what I wanted my major to be when I went into college. Community college allowed me to take classes in a few different areas to see what I would like the most. I was able to find classes that held my attention and actually made me think about the topics the class covered. This is how I found what I would eventually major in when I transferred schools.
Going to a community college also helped me get ready for what a four year school would be like. High school didn't really prepare me for what the course work would be like in college. Or anything that college would be like.
Because I decided to go to a community college before going away to school, I was able to make up for my poor high school grades. I loved the fact that I didn't need SAT scores to apply to the schools I wanted because I already had a college degree. They didn't even need any of my high school records. All they needed was the records from my time at the community college.
So it's okay if you go to a community college. It doesn't make your degree mean anything less. It's still a degree. It doesn't mean that you're not smart or that you're too lazy or any of the other negative things that are generally said about CC students.
