My biggest fear when choosing to attend an all girls middle/high school, was that I would lose my ability to interact with boys. I had attended a co-ed elementary school, but my developmental years were spent surrounded by a community of mostly girls. Yes, there were a few male teachers and yes, I had some male friends outside of school, but my closest friends were all female. This never bothered me in middle school. I was more concerned with making friends and having fun with them than I was with meeting guys and possibly getting a boyfriend. Boys were pretty much off my radar completely.
Then came high school. People started going to parties, drinking, doing drugs, and getting boyfriends. It seemed like it happened overnight. I was suddenly struck by this pressure that I had to start going out and meeting guys over the weekend or else I would be socially inept when I got to college. Everyone was quickly making their own “outside of school friends” and hanging out with them on the weekend. Why was I not doing this? Was I immature? Did the mailman forget to drop off the “How to be a High School Kid” pamphlet? Was I a dud? I was constantly getting down on myself about my inexperience with parties and boys which really did a number on my self esteem. If I couldn’t talk to boys in high school, what was I going to do when I got to college? It didn’t dawn on me till the end of freshman year, after I had forced myself to some parties and interacted with my fair share of boys, that there was nothing wrong with me. My lack of motivation to go out and meet guys wasn’t because I was “irregular” or “immature.” There were tons of other people out there that cared more about making memories with their best friends than having nights that they didn’t even remember. It was at the beginning of sophomore year that I met 9 people who I now consider more to be sisters than friends. When we did go to parties, we were highly skilled at talking to boys because boys are just people. It took a while to realize that talking to them does not take practice and it certainly does not take some magical power that only some people possess.
Now I’m in college. There was no doubt in my mind that I wanted to attend a co-ed college. I loved my all-girls school and I don’t regret it for a second, but I was ready for something new. I was neither terrified for the transition nor was I overly eager to flawlessly integrate into a co-ed community. It was just another chapter of my life that I was nervous to begin.
The first thing I sought at college was a close knit community of girls. This was one of the main reasons I joined Her Campus. As humans we naturally cling to people that are similar to us and we try to mimic our previous situations in order to feel most comfortable. It’s not that I felt uncomfortable around guys, but in this unfamiliar environment, I was looking for something familiar and boys just weren’t as familiar to me as girls were. The main reason that I chose a single-sex middle and high school was the fact that studies show that people are less likely to censor themselves whilst surrounded by people of their same sex. Now that I have been to several classes, all of which have at least 3 male students, it has not crossed my mind to censor my answers or comments for fear of embarrassing myself. I thank my single-sex education for this.
Although I still talk to my best friends from high school every single day, I have also become quite close with both guys and girls here at Skidmore. For those of you either considering the switch from single-sex to co-ed education or those of you who are in my position, I think it’s important to do whatever you want in order to feel most comfortable. There is no need to force yourself to hang out with boys if you’re not comfortable doing so. By speaking to my friends from high school we’ve learned that there is no right or wrong way to acclimate to a co-ed environment and getting used to college, no matter what type of school you came from, is difficult.