It’s surprising to believe that ⅛ of my college experience has already passed. My first semester at UT Austin was filled with new experiences founded on my values and comforts. The year started out slow and seemed to feel like an atypical high school experience. I missed my close friends from high school and I wasn’t sure when everyone would be free to talk. What’s more, my roommate and I seemed quite different and I had to learn to balance our schedules, and interests — something we did as we grew more comfortable with one another.
Still, I enjoyed my classes and continued to put my head down and work. As the second month rolled by I began to notice that the same people were in five of my seven classes, a unique aspect of UT Austin’s FIG program for first year students.
Soon, I began to talk to my classmates and those conversations turned into study sessions and shared meals. For the first time I was meeting people way out of my comfort zone, and creating so many memorable ‘firsts’ from realizing laundry had to be separated by color, to figuring out where the nearest bus stop was.
The semester appeared to bring revelations from every dimension: not only did I enjoy my social life here at university, but my academic life as well. As someone who had taken STEM classes for most of high school, my first semester full of Liberal Arts courses was a pleasant surprise.
A month or so into the semester I began volunteering with my research lab. Every Thursday we would go to a local middle school to build connections with bilingual students and provide them a space to build friendships, practice Spanish and take some weight off after a busy day. Here I grew close with the other reasearch assistants and even some of the students who looked forward to meeting us every week (who often called us ‘HookEm’ instead of Longhorns).
As the pumpkin of October rolled by, so did mideterms and its madness. In a moment of quiet comfort was a rare natural phenomenon: on October 14th 2023 a partial solar eclipse glided over the main mall of UT Austin. I watched the eclipse with a friend and fell in love with how the campus transformed along with the sky. That afternoon the main mall was full of professors, and parents trying to learn about the eclipse, while young children jumped on bounce houses. Near the turtle pond, kids eagerly pet turtles and called them funny names as their parents tried to plead with them to leave the animals alone.
November brought the long pause of Thanksgiving break before the frantic nature of finals. As the year turned its corner we said our well wishes, most of us freshmen trying to wrap our heads around the fact that classes ran on a semester long basis. We wouldn’t have classes with most of our friends next semester, we would all be following different paths corresponding with different majors, but we promised each other to catch up for lunch in the dining halls or find an excuse to meet.
As I continue through the second semester I notice how the foundations I placed last fall help support me now. My friends and I still meet, I maintain close connections with my high school peers, and I’m exploring everything from academics to college experiences. When I look back at what the first semester taught me, it was to be willing to learn and seek moments that turn into splendid stories. Here is to the next 7/8th of my college experience!