Along with graduating from high school, finishing my first semester of college was a big milestone that I reached in 2018. During the 17 weeks between August 16th and December 14th, it felt like the longest, most endless, semester of my entire life. However, by the end of it, the semester seemed to have flown by and I learned a lot of things about myself and about my relationships with others that I am eternally grateful for.
Procrastination is something that I personally struggled with all throughout high school. It was easy to wait until the last minute to finish my work, as long as I finished it before I was assigned even more. High school work loar was absolutely nothing compared to college workload. My senior year, I took five AP “college level’ classes and it was not nearly as overwhelming as taking five actual college classes. It was definitely an adjustment realizing that I would have to change the work ethic that I was long adapted to, in order to succeed in my college courses. I eventually learned how to manage my time and how not to procrastinate, and it ultimately made me much more successful in my classes and took away a majority of my stress.
2. Early classes aren’t for everyone.
Some people are able to wake up at 7am, get ready for the day, and be on their way to their first class by 7:45am. However, I am not one of those people. Not even close. I thought because I was used to waking up at 7am for class in high school that a 9am definitely wouldn’t be an issue. Boy was I wrong. For some reason, college early classes hit differently than high school early classes. It didn’t matter if I set 25 alarms, I was not getting out of my bed until the VERY last minute, which often resulted in me walking into my 700 person lecture late. Thankfully, on Tuesdays and Thursdays my English class didn’t begin until 12pm, so I wasn’t late to my classes EVERY day!
3. Friends don’t last forever.
Friends don’t last forever. Point blank period. They just don’t. As much as we want to believe that we’ll stay friends with all of our friends from high school and all of the friends we make in college, this just isn’t always the case. Some of my “closest” friends from first semester don’t even make eye contact when they see me anymore. You aren’t going to always be compatible with every friend you make, and that’s okay. Some people are just your “class” friends, and that’s okay. Friendships don’t always last forever, and if you don’t meet your college best friends during your first semester, THAT’S OKAY. As for high school friends, long distance relationships are hard, romantically or not. We get busy, we have different schedules, we get preoccupied, and we fade. That’s okay! It happens, and everything happens for a reason, even if it hurts a little.
4. It is important to make friends that understand your struggles.
THIS is something that I learned after reflecting on my first semester, but didn’t exactly recognize during my first semester. When I say “friends that understand your struggles”, I mean that in many contexts. For me, that meant that it is important that I make friends who are in Schreyer, friends that are Biobehavioral Health/Pre-med majors, and friends that are people of color. I was pretty successful in the first two during my first semester, but not so much in the latter. As a black student in a Primarily White Institution, I realized that many of the racial struggles I encountered during my first semester could’ve been supported if I had more friends who experienced the same things – friends that have experienced being the only POC in their class, friends that have had people ignorantly question them about their hair, the list goes on. It is important to have friends that understand your struggles because it is important to have friends that can give you SUPPORT, which is one reason that I am so grateful for safe spaces like the Paul Robeson Cultural Center. We are all struggling out here, like it or not, but having support from your peers is vital in facilitating your success.
5. College is NOT all fun and games.