Only a handful of people from my high school applied to go to the university I go to, and I could count how many of those people ended up going there with my fingers – of just one hand. My high school was one of those schools where students didn’t believe in attending the university closest to home. Every time the specific educational institution came up in conversation, the other person I would be speaking to would make a disgusted face and respond how they could never go to a college near home; it was automatically the worst school out there (despite being ranked one of the best in the nation) to many people simply because it was the closest one. I never understood why back then, and to this day I really still don’t understand why people looked at the idea so poorly.

Choosing which college you want to go to shouldn’t be about how close or far it is from where you currently live. It should be more about what it has to offer you as a student. When selecting where you want to spend the next 4 or more years of your life, it’s important to consider the academic programs that the university has to offer as well as the organizations and opportunities for advancement that it can provide you with; each person has their own individual requests when it comes to those types of things, and not every school will accommodate his or her every need. As a student, one of the few universities that did offer everything I wanted was the one closest to home. Additionally, it should be a place that you look forward to living at and/or coming to every school day; if you’re not comfortable there, then why even go? Clearly it’s not the right one for you. And after narrowing down my choices and making some trips, it only took a walking tour of the college I currently attend to know that it was the school for me in the end.

People will do anything and everything they can to get as far away as possible from the place they grew up, simply to just get away from the town or their family or some other third reason. But distance really doesn’t make much of a difference in your college experience; it has no real effect on it at all (besides in the possibility of whether or not you end up living on campus). You’re still going to make new friends and open new doors just the same whether you’re 5 hours from home or a mere 5 minutes.

I chose the university closest to home, and I can happily say I have no regrets. It’s the perfect school for me, and I know that I wouldn’t feel the same about my college experience had I gone anywhere else. I knew my university was ‘the one’ for me, and distance was never considered as a factor – and that’s the way it should be for every student out there.