I think we can all agree that college is like a roller coaster ride with all of its ups and downs, loops and turns, love and hate. Hopefully, there are more aspects that hit a high note than ones that don’t. But for the ones that don’t, they end up forcing us to whine for hours to our girlfriends through texts or at the cafe, whimper to our loved ones via tear-filled phone calls, depressing tweets and/or status updates that allow the accepting of pity in the form of “likes” and “retweets” from others.
Despite the fact that everyone thinks college kids spend their entire four years eating junk, wasting money, and playing beer pong with our buddies, being a college kid definitely isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. The following are a few things that either I myself complain about, or are general complaints over the student population. But because we don’t want any more negativity than is needed, I did my best to find the silver linings to, hopefully, shed some light on the pure absurdity of some of the common college irritations.
Finals
Love: I think we can all love the fact that during Finals week it is a 100% acceptable to slump around campus in huge sweaters, sweatpants and a pair of moccasins. The vending machines are stocked and no one will even look up from their laptops or books to see you buy 3 bags of M&M’s and chips and gain 5 lbs in one week because of stress-induced snacking. You definitely don’t have time to waste waiting in line at the café to get a semi-healthy dinner to fuel your all-night study sessions, so Dominos it is!
Hate: I know I’m not the only one who doesn’t keep their Finals week complaints hush-hush. Professors have to be crazy to think that we can memorize 3 months worth of information in one short week! We will never be able to take back those sleepless nights spent in the library ruining our eye sights reviewing 500 PowerPoint slides and developing carpal tunnel writing out hundreds of note cards we barely even have time to review!
Group Projects
Love:Let’s be real, if this group project is getting you out of taking an exam or writing a ten page paper, you know you’re going to be sucking it up and making cue-cards as needed for your group. I wouldn’t say group projects are complete jokes, but you can always look forward to someone to stumble over words even your professor can’t pronounce.
Hate:Why is it that we always end up in the “randomly” assigned group with the slacker kid who didn’t even bother buying a book for the class and the diva that is too busy highlighting all her notes in fluorescent pink sharpie to actually read what is on the paper? I’ve got no other choice than to stay up all night in the Library putting together presentation cue-cards for my not so charming group members so they don’t mess up my hard earned average. If that’s not annoying, I don’t know what is.
Floormates
Love:Floormates who don’t listen to crappy music, press snooze 15 times before waking up or keep you up all night jumping on the bed with their boyfriend will soon become your best friends. They’ll be someone to talk to and share mutual complaints with when the boys next door are playing C.O.D. on full blast all night when you’re trying to sleep and they’ll be a shoulder to cry on when you’re puppy passes away. Some suck, but most floor mates are usually pretty splendid.
Hate: Thin walls and a small amount square footage means that you’re going to get to know your floor mates even if you don’t want to. You’ve probably been woken up by their alarm clock, bothered by their poor choices in music and disgusted by any and all activities that sound even somewhat close to what could be sex.
Registration
Love:So, you didn’t get any of the classes required for your major and now you’re stuck taking all general education courses with a bunch of kids you’ve never even seen before. Look at it as a good opportunity to make some friends! New classes with new faces means you’re going to have to make some connections before you’re stuck with the kids nobody wanted for their group project! (See above). Who doesn’t like more friends?!
Hate:Waiting until 5pm for your sign up time, entering in the schedule you took 5 hours to plan and surprise! You’re not getting a single one of the classes you wanted because they’re all closed out due to the fact that everyone got to register before you! You scramble around for another hour trying to pick classes that won’t alter your chances of graduating on time until you realize there is just no hope. Print out that add/drop sheet and hope for the best kids, registration almost never goes the way we want it to.
Regardless of how much we hate some of the things that come along with being a college student, most of them aren’t as bad as we make them out to be. Since there’s no way around taking finals and suffering through group projects, my best advice is to smile and get through it. You’re only here for four years (most of the time) so you might as well make the most of it while you can! Enjoy the rest of your year!