As a class of 2020 high school graduate, I feel like a lot of culminating experiences were taken away from me due to COVID-19. Between not having a prom, graduation, senior-week trip or any of the other exciting senior activities that you look forward to growing up, I felt robbed.
I feared that when I came to college in the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, I would miss out on even more of those experiences. However, despite the unconventional first year that many of us had, I don’t feel like I was robbed of anything.
- Closer Friendships
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Making friends in college is a famously nerve-racking feat. The ever-so-awkward first moves, the self-cringing when you ask for their phone number and the constant fear of rejection highlight freshman year. When entering college in the midst of a pandemic, that fear was intensified. However, once I got over the initial nerves and had found a group of friends that I enjoyed being around, I had more fun than I would have ever expected.
Doing classes online and constantly being in the dorms allowed us to see each other a lot more often than if we had all been scattered around campus all day. Whether it was each of us putting in headphones and attending our Zoom lectures, or just doing our homework, we were always in the same room doing it together.
This allowed us to create much deeper bonds than I would have ever expected. Spending almost every second of every day with the same group of people brings you a lot closer, a lot faster. Something that I thought would be even more difficult during a pandemic was actually a lot easier.
- Partying isn’t everything
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College isn’t just about earning a degree, it’s about an experience. It is the time in your life when you have the most amount of freedom and the least amount of responsibility. So naturally, partying in college is something many of us look forward to.
Of course, with a pandemic looming, partying wasn’t necessarily the best idea. It was something we rarely did because of the fear of catching and spreading the virus. However, when thinking back on my favorite memories from my freshman year, not a single one of them happened at a party. It was always the more mundane nights that had me smiling ear to ear and laughing until I couldn’t breathe. I was more than satisfied with my partying experience, but came to prefer the spontaneous fun with my inner circle more.
- Campus was still accessible
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Another valid fear many of us had was the fear of isolation and feeling trapped in our dorms. After months and months of no in-person contact with other people, I was scared of that same confinement when coming to college.
I was again proven wrong because campus was always accessible. Whether it was meeting a friend at the HUB to do our classes together, grinding out long assignments in the library, relaxing on the grassy areas in the spring, studying on the bridge of one of my favorite buildings or lounging in a hammock outside of my dorm with friends, I was always out and about around campus. I feel I had an even greater chance to explore the campus than I would have if I had had to fill my days rushing in between buildings to get to classes.
- Classes were just as challenging
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“Your college professors won’t put up with that” is a phrase we have all probably heard coming from a high school teacher at one point. College classes are supposed to be more intens and more challenging than they were in high school. But because of the pandemic, all of our classes were virtual.
I thought that this would make them a lot easier than they would have been. I was wrong. Classes were just as challenging and stressful as I thought they would have been pre-pandemic. The “struggle” that everybody talks about was present. I don’t feel like I was given the easy route, and although it was stressful, the struggle made me feel like I wasn’t missing out on an experience.
- I Learned the Lessons I was supposed to
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As I said above, college is not only about earning a degree, but the experience as well. It is a brand new experience for most, living away from home and your family, starting fresh, meeting new people and learning to be independent.
The pandemic didn’t stop any of these lessons from being learned. I learned how to function on my own without my parents and siblings. I learned how to manage my time properly. I learned my boundaries and restrictions (8 a.m. is too way early). I learned to wash my sheets and to not leave my laundry until it is full. I learned everything is expensive. I learned how to keep my space today without nagging reminders from my mom. I learned how to call for doctors and dentist appointments and how to take care of myself when sick and so much more.
The pandemic didn’t take any of these lesson-learning opportunities away from me.
The pandemic did change a lot of aspects of my freshman year. There were no in-person sporting events, no dorm visitors, a scarce number of on-campus events, etc. However, the unique experience that the pandemic created for us created a first-year experience that I wouldn’t trade for the world. Additions most definitely outnumbered losses.