I just completed the first week of my freshman year of college, but it feels much longer than a week. For the past two years I’ve basically watched every YouTube video there is on what to expect your freshman year, so obviously I felt beyond prepared for what was to come. But I was far from it. A couple of fellow freshmen friends of mine have compiled a list of things that no one told us before coming to college.
- You really are your own person now
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Back in high school, our schedule was pretty strict and there wasn’t much freedom to do anything: you’d wake up at 7, go to classes for the next 8 hours, do any after school activities like sports, clubs, or work, get home and do homework, chat with some friends or scroll aimlessly through Twitter, eat at some point and then go into bed. This would repeat for five days and you’d have the weekend to do whatever you want and the cycle begins again.
But in college, no one has any control over how you structure your day or what you do. You could literally decide to sleep in all day and NO ONE, not a single soul would care! (Maybe your mom, but that doesn’t count). And you have to be super intentional about when you’re gonna eat, when you should go to bed and when is the best time is for you to study. You have to start and take initiative over your own life, and that realization hit a little harder than I expected.
- There are parties, like every night
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Of course, being the first week back, people are excited and want to see each other so they start to throw parties as soon as possible. So I came into school expecting a party each night, especially the first week. But in reality, there were about 3 parties, EVERY night. It made me start to question whether or not some of these students were even enrolled or had classes to go to because partying is EXHAUSTING and I couldn’t imagine being out every night. Granted they are a lot of fun, but everything in moderation is even better.
- You’ll be given assignments the first day
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The first week of the new school year is usually dubbed “Sylly Week.” This is where all your professors do is just play name games or the notorious “ND Intro” and hand you the syllabus which outlines everything you’re going to do for the semester. But I was shocked when 20 minutes into the class, the professor pulls out the powerpoint and starts going over the first chapter of the textbook that I hadn’t even read the name of or knew where I was going to buy it yet. However, every other upperclassman pulled out their paper and pencil like this was expected. No one thought to mention in any of their videos that you’re actually going to learn something your first week, nonetheless your first class.
But all in all, I enjoyed my first week of college. It’s a lot tougher than high school obviously, but I’m excited to be able to establish myself as an adult and experience more of what the world has to offer, even if no one prepared me well enough for it.