Author: Becca's rose

Two pieces of advice I have for a happy experience at college are making new friends and planning out your week. One of most successful ways to meet people and make friends at college is by putting myself out there. An example of this was at bingo in the first week of school I saw someone sitting alone and so we went to sit by her and now she is one of my best friends here. Trying new things or being the one to strike up a conversation is another effective way to meet people. Although even if people seem to have a friend group it may lead to them neglecting their studies. Some students struggle with how to manage their time wisely and end up scrambling to catch up. I have found it easy to schedule my week out. What this means is on Sunday, I look at what I have going on for the week whether it is academics, extracurriculars, or my social life and I plan what assignments I have to do each day so that I am able to enjoy myself when I am out doing things, not worrying about an assignment I have due at midnight that I should have already done.

Other keys to success I have found useful are good study habits and keeping in contact with my family. I schedule out my week but that does not equal an easy study time. For example, I just took a psych test and for it we must study hard for it. Most students think they can just do the assignment and take notes and they will get an A on the tests. The secret of success to taking a test that is working for me is to do the normal notes, study guides, quizzes, but also create my own notes based off the textbook, like active reading. Students may thrive in academics and social life yet be missing one thing, connecting with their family. It is a huge transition into college for those living on campus. Yet a trick that I have found as someone who is very much a homebody is to facetime my family at least once a week. This way we get to talk about our weeks as if we were when I was living at home. No one has the college life completely figured out, but these tricks have helped me thrive in our new environment.

images of a secret – Search (bing.com)

Living in the dorms comes with its own challenges such as not being able to control the heat. It was challenging during the first week of school with no air conditioning, which meant constantly having multiple fans going to help regulate my body temperature. Another con to living in the dorm, is the size of the room itself, I am used to having more storage in my house to put all my belongings but here I do not have much storage space, and it is shared with my roommate. Living on the third floor of my dorm building also means I must be aware of my neighbors not only around me, but also below me. The closeness of proximity to others applies to them too; the walls are paper thin, so quite often I can hear my neighbors around me. Another disadvantage of my dorm building is that there is no elevator so each time I want to exit or enter, do laundry, or go to the lounge I must make the trek up and down the flights of stairs. Although, this does help me get more steps in for the day.

As much of a struggle it can be to live in a dorm, some days there are also many positives to living in one. I have always had to share my bedroom with at least one of my siblings so naturally I have become good at sharing space with others. Luckily for me I am rooming with one of my best friends from high school and so far, we are still friends. I can honestly say that this time we have only strengthened our friendship because we are constantly around each other. Not only did I become closer with my roommate, but I have met a lot of friends within my building, and one of them I just learned is in our writing class but did not know that she also lives in the same dorm building. Another advantage of the dorms here at UW-Green Bay is the private bathrooms. It has been extremely nice not to have to go down the hall or go to a different level just to get to it. Living in a dorm also gives me a chance to decorate a room with all my things from home to make it feel cozier. I love to decorate so it was fun to go shopping and put-up new decorations in the dorm. Overall, I am enjoying the dorm experience more than I thought that I would and am excited to see what twists and turns come with it throughout the rest of the year.

pro and cons scale – Bing images

Our parents are not here to tell us what to eat, when to do our homework, when we should exercise. I am responsible for listening and waking up to my own alarm in the morning. I get to choose when I eat now instead of my mother saying, “you cannot eat that; we are about to eat dinner.” Although usually I can still hear her voice subconsciously telling me to choose a salad over ice cream. Also, I can choose how I dress now because I am not confined to the dress code of my high school saying: “no showing the collar bone, all shorts and dresses must be three inches above the knee or longer,” or my mother asking me to change my clothes because she believes they are too indecent for going out in public. However, how I choose to spend my time is one of the biggest differences between living at home and being in high school. At home my parents would check if I had completed my homework before I could relax and watch tv. At college I can reward myself with more breaks because I have more free time to do my homework and relax.

As much independence as I have, not all of it is a blessing. There are a lot of great mentors here from teachers to RA’s, even new friends, but none of them can give advice like my mom can. If I am having a bad day and just need some encouragement, she is not there to tell me it is going to be okay and give me a big hug. I am still learning how to be most efficient with time management. I do not have a good strategy set up besides doing as much as I can earlier in the week to get it done, knowing I am usually busier later in the week. This method works to an extent, but I am used to having a specific routine like I did in high school. Throughout high school I would go to school, then sports practice, then I would come home and eat dinner and then do homework. In college, with fewer classes and having more free time, it is harder to create such a strict schedule for myself. Overall, I am enjoying having the freedom to become my own person at college, but just like anything, it has its challenges. 

Source: Google Image