Growing up I definitely was not raised in a small town. Coming from a town just south of Denver with over 90,000 as the population I also had big class sizes and a very small teacher to student ratio throughout school. So when picking a college and where I would spend my next four years I wanted nothing more than individual attention with teachers and staff of the university I was paying thousands to. This need lead me to choose a school of only about 1,200 students, which is funny coming from a high school almost double the size. Then after about three weeks I realized I hated the small school atmosphere and decided I would transfer for my sophomore year of college. Now I attend a state university that has almost 35,000 students enrolled and rapidly growing. I now have experienced both extremes of college sizes and here are the major difference I have noticed.

Classes.

When attending a small school you will maybe have 20 students in your classes, maybe. (My first semester of college I had a class of only eight). This has its perks, you will always have access to the professor for questions, you can make friends easier, and you'll automatically have a study group because usually it is assigned. Having a small class really gives you the tools to do well since the teacher will be able to see if you are struggling. With a small school you are more accounted for and have a little more guidance through the course.

Now with a large school you are able to fall through the cracks a little more. Most of the time you are not getting individualized class until your third year, if that. Before then you are mostly just a number to professors. You have to put in a lot more effort to have a strong relationship with your teacher and they are less accessible outside office hours. This can have its perks though too. You are almost never in class with the same people so you get a lot more diversity and class discussions can be more interesting. You also are able to learn in the best way that suits you because you do have more freedom.

Social Life.

The social life at both small and large school are pretty similar. We are all college students and we generally enjoy doing the same activities. There are football games, parties, clubs, and community events.

At a small school a big difference is that it is most likely to be in a smaller town. This can be limiting with fun activities to do. While a larger school is probably in a larger town and has a lot more to see and do. Larger schools are also normally closer to, or in big cities so professional sports or a stripe mall is probably not too far from your dorm.

A pro tip about small schools: whoever you see on a Saturday night will be the person you have a group project with Monday in class. Be on your best behavior. While at a large school you will probably never see any of those people again, do the slip and slide.

Attendance.

At a small school ALWAYS go to class, attendance is almost always taken. The professor knows your name and will call you out next class. They will know when you are sick because they will ask for doctor's note. They also know when your sports team is out of town.

At a large school they could not care less if you ever show up. Except labs, always go to labs. But you are paying someone around $150 or more per class so I advise that you go anyway. Just because you have the freedom to not go, those 10 iClicker points could make or break your grade.

School Spirit.

This one is hard because I am only speaking from pure experience. School spirit is generally depending on the crowd, the students, and community. Your team could be the worst team in the league but you could have the best spirit, or opposite.

Generally with small schools you are going to get less school spirit. There are large universities in almost every state and you are going to probably get more fans at the basketball game wearing a pro team or a large school's mascot than your own. But these games are still fun because you probably know almost every person playing, making cheering your favorite player a lot easier. But who is our rivals? Nobody really knows.

In a large school there is a lot of alumni. This is probably the majority of the population in the crowd. I know as a student I go to the big games and I know a few people who try to make it to every game. But generally the crowd for larger school are their alumni and community members. Although with larger schools you have tailgating that is more fun than the actual game, and a lot cheaper. The school spirit at these games (especially your rivals) are going to be crazy, you will run into some die hard fans, and they are always full of energy.

Townies.

Small school: everyone wants to leave their small town.

Large school: nobody wants to leave their college town.

Homework.

Homework at small schools is minimal. I found that you have more class time because it is not just lectures. So with all this extra time you can get your work done during the class time instead of at home. Also with smaller schools you will have more assignments which means more work, but you have more grades going into your final grade making the exams not as important to your final grade.

At a large school your whole grade basically relies on your exam scores. All these exams are also taken using scantrons so there will not be any fill in the blank questions. In larger schools you are going to have a lecture the entire class period but you are able to get out early if the professor has said everything they need to for the day. So you will not have class time to get some work done but you can have extra time if a class gets out early.

Dining Halls.

At a small school you will probably only have one dining hall compared to a large school that can have several choices. The best thing about a large school is the late night snacks you can buy with your "*insert school mascot* cash". Small schools dining hall will probably close around 10, even on the weekends and for some reason they refuse to sell Starbucks. Large or small the food is made in mass amounts and you're probably going to consume more pizza and waffles than you ever have before.

Sports.

Since smaller schools have less students enrolled, they have less money and funding to advertise. Therefore they are not known as well as larger schools. There is also less of a tradition for children of alumni to attend the same school as their parents at a smaller school.

The lower amount of advertising causes less people to know about the school so they tend to over recruit to get students to come to the school. Smaller schools will hand out sport scholarships like candy to attempt to increase their enrollment. This causes almost every person at the school to be involved in a sport, it is actually unusual to find someone who is not a collegiate athlete. If they are not in a sport they usually are president of a club or have a very large academic scholarship.

At a large school sports are very political and very competitive. They are mostly for the students that are wanting to go pro or training for a big event. It is hard to become an athlete at a large school and those who do are very respected. These athletes also have a lot of pressure on them to be the best since they are usually broadcast nationally at some point, and have a much larger fan base.

Opportunity.

After attending both a small and large school I have seen that you have different opportunities to further your future career or give you different strengths.

Small schools allow you to create stronger relationships with professors and other professionals. When you join an organization there are less people involved and needed to run it so the sponsor and your peers are more accessible to create better relationships. These relationships can lead to leadership positions, internships, and networking. Also since the town is smaller you will be able to find opportunities with companies in your future profession that you can shadow or have an internship with.

With large schools you have a little less of a chance of gaining those close relationships or having a leadership role. But when you do you have a little more respect for having that position because it was harder to achieve. Being at a large school does allow you to have more options for what you would like to get involved in. Larger schools and cities will have more opportunity to get internships at larger, more respected companies. Big cities also allow for more networking and relationships to be created just by talking to be people on public transportation or professional events like career fairs.

Whether you choose a large or a small school, it will be what you make of it. Both have their pros and cons, but your attitude can make or break your college career. You only get so long in college so make it count. Go to the sporting event, join a club, change your major. This is the time we are supposed to be figuring out who we are and what we want, which can be done anywhere. There no right or wrong choice when it comes to picking a college, it is choosing where is going to be best for you.

Now that school is about to start I hope all the new college students take these differences and see the best in the schools they chose.