The entire time I was in high school, every teacher I had made college seem like an insurmountable struggle that will destroy you. Whether it was horror stories of grades being based on a single test the whole semester, 40-page papers, or being completely alone, it now seems as if high school tried more to scare me away from college than prepare me for it. So, I am going to clarify (and bring to light) some misconceptions many high school students might have about college.
College is not for everyone. This might be one of the most important things that public school refused to even speak of, but it's true. Not everyone is called to higher education in the form of college, and that is okay. There is a misconception that the job market requires at least an associates degree of some kind, when in reality that's not true. You can make an incredible living simply by going to trade school and working for construction or oil companies (assuming a comfortable life correlates directly with one's financial situation, holding all else equal). If you want to be a doctor or a lawyer or a teacher, yes, you will need a degree from an accredited university. Regardless, simply going out and making a name for yourself has so much more to do with communication skills and networking than it does an advanced education. While it's true that college can provide greater opportunity to hone the aforementioned skills, it doesn't necessarily negate the reality that a college degree is not necessary to obtain these skills and utilize them to do what you love.
My AP teachers were harsher than my college professors. Every. Single. One. Of. Them. I cannot even begin to count how many times I was told that college professors do not offer extra credit or drop any grades. I have had more opportunities in one year of college for extra credit than I ever did in high school. Not only that, but I have only had one professor not drop any grades. College professors understand that we are humans who have off days and have a lot going on and will almost always work with you if you show effort (at least at Baylor). Professors here are not out to fail their students and collect tenure. They have a real emotional investment in their students and are significantly more human than my high school teachers made them out to be.
MLA is useless. I spent an insane amount of hours in high school sweating over the works cited page and sitting through library lectures on advanced searching techniques and how to cite in MLA format. That is all pointless. Let me clarify—I have to use MLA still for English papers, but in the real world, outside of education, no one uses MLA. Not even the magazine that I am writing for right now uses MLA. I wish that, instead of learning about what to italicize, High School taught me more important things such as how to pay taxes or how credit works. You know, real life things that people use on a day-to-day basis. Those horror stories of book-length English papers that you have to write do not exist. Not only are most papers two to six pages average (including that beloved works cited page), but they are double spaced.
You register for your own classes, and that may seem like a given until you actually do it. In High School, you sit down with an advisor who holds your hand through the process, and when you walk out of their office, you know what your schedule is going to look like because they do it all for you. In college, if you don't put effort into figuring out your schedule you are SOL. Advisors in College have thousands of more students to deal with, and thus the most they do for you is recommend what classes you take. It is up to you to figure out what classes you need to take, what professors are best, when to take those classes, and to actually go sign up for them. And the worst part is (especially for underclassmen), the schedule you make will almost always have to be redone. Either you will be waitlisted or just flat out have to find something else because registration is the most cut throat every-student-for-yourself event in college.
College will be the best years of your life. You shouldn't be scared of it or become so anxious that you become aloof. Go into office hours and befriend your professors, be ontop of everything including registration, and pursue your dreams. If you are one of the many people who college is not for, go to a trade school and be proud of the fact that you won't be living the rest of your life in student debt. Above all else, praise God that you have all of the opportunities that you do and never stop taking advantage of them.
