Dear Freshman,
I can only imagine what’s going through your mind about the year that lies ahead of you. From personal experience, I know that you’re being given “advice” on what to expect about freshman year. Here’s what you need to do with everything you’re being told: store it in the back of your mind in case the one situation you’ve been given advice on ever comes up. There are so many things I wish I had actually been told about college instead of the things I was told. I feel like there were more important things to hear than the typical “just say 'no,'" “don’t drink and drive,” “call/text me every day,” etc. I hope that some of the things you’re going to read will be more useful than your “typical” going-off-to-college advice. College isn’t what you’re expecting. There’s more to it than making good grades and partying. While these are major pieces of the puzzle, there are still smaller pieces that you have to fit into your life’s puzzle.
Most of the advice you’ve been given going through high school is completely inaccurate. For example, the professors aren’t terrifying like you’ve been led to believe. The classes also aren’t as killer as you’ve been led to believe. Don’t get me wrong, they are difficult at times but not like your high school teachers have told you over and over. You also need to know that you’re going to fail at least one assignment, whether it be a paper or a test, so be prepared. It’s not the end of the world and you’re still going to pass the class.
There will be days when you have to take a personal day and not go to a certain class in order to protect your own sanity. There are going to be nights when you have to stay up until some awful hour to attempt to write a decent paper in time to turn it the next day. There will also be times where your roommate has to drag you out of the bed in order to get you to your 9 a.m. class. Your roommate is either going to be one of your best friends or your worst enemies. Take it from me, it’s easier to become friends with the person you’re living with than it is to hold grudges.
Aside from your roommate, you’re going to make a lot of new friends in the beginning, but you’re not going to keep all of them. You’ll still talk to them when you pass them on campus, but you’ll also stop going out of your to make plans with them and keep up with them. During your freshman year, you’re going to find “your person”. This is the best friend that will make you forget that you haven’t known them for long, the one that’ll be there no matter what time you call, and the one who you’re going to keep for the rest of your life. There are plenty of other things that I can try to warn you about or prepare you for, but college is really something that you have to experience for yourself to truly understand.
