As I was recently watching the movie Van Wilder, the story of a college student who is afraid of life after school, I realized how many movies promote the idea that the typical "college experience" involves a curfew-free life of endless partying, a lot of junk food and moving into the dorms. I guess the movies were wrong, because I have yet to experience the on-campus lifestyle — I’m still living at home.
For me, things are a little different. I moved here from Venezuela four years ago, and the cultural differences between my country and this one are very apparent.
For one, the traditional college student in my country lives in his or her parents' house until marriage — not cool. And second of all, if you are allowed to move out, you would typically live in an apartment by yourself without any roommates — simply because having roommates is considered "weirdz" and not a common thing to do. In America, having roommates is the most common way of living for a college student.
The problem is that I’ve grown up in the American culture, and when I graduated high school, I was expecting my parents to just let me go and allow me to live on campus like many other college students.
Unfortunately, that wasn’t the case. Because of the culture differences, I feel like I’ve missed out on a lot of great dorm experiences.
When I was in high school, going to college and moving into the dorms was a big deal. It didn’t matter if the dorms were smaller than a box or if you were going to have to share the bathroom with five other people. The point is that it is an experience in your freshman year of college that you’ll never forget.
But five months after graduation, I’m still at my parents' house with a curfew of 1 a.m., and I still have to deal with a constant drill of questions regarding where I’m going and who I’m going with... how annoying.
For the record, it’s not like I hate living at my parents' house. After all, I don’t pay for rent, I always have nice food on the table, and I have a pool and a Jacuzzi for me to use whenever I want.
The problem is that a lot of memorable things happen while living in the dorms that are good for any freshman’s social life, like memories of staying up all night with a bunch of friends in somebody’s dorm or even going to local school concerts. I feel like living in the dorms completes what I dreamt would be my college experience as a freshman.
Some of my older friends — who have already lived at the dorms — keep telling me that I have to live in the dorms for at least one semester because of the experience. I don’t even think I would care if I had to sleep in a room that’s 10 times smaller than mine or that I had roommates. At least I would feel like I’m finally in college and not necessarily just going to class.
In a way, I’m kind of happy that I still do live at home, because at least I don’t have as many distractions as I would have if I lived in the dorms. I wouldn't study as much, I'd eat a lot more junk food, and I'd go to a lot more parties.
Sunday, November 25, 2007
Sunday, November 18, 2007
Astronomy- The Most Dreaded Class for a Freshman
Tuesday and Thursday afternoons are when I start complaining. My stomach gets into knots, I suddenly feel sick and I find all kinds of excuses to try to not go to my most dreaded class: astronomy.
When I was registering for classes this summer, I couldn’t decide between all the cool classes that I wanted to take. I distinctly remember trying to choose between French and German, art history and psychology, and of course, astronomy and chemistry.
I chose astronomy — big mistake.
On the first day of class, I was excited to go to astronomy. I couldn’t wait to learn about the planets and go to the observations to look at the stars. Even my parents kept talking about how much I was going to like that class. Well, as it turns out, they were wrong.
And so was I.
It turns out the material is not as exciting as I originally thought it would be and the class gets so bad that people actually leave in the middle of the lecture — something I later learned was normal in college.
Not even in high school did I ever have a class that would make me feel so sick minutes before it. The class that I disliked the most in high school was trigonometry... and even that wasn’t as bad as astronomy.
My trigonometry teacher at least tried to get us somewhat involved in the lecture. She would come up with geeky anecdotes about her weekend and she'd give us free candy during the holidays.
But I guess not everything is bad about my astronomy class — there's always going to be a class in your schedule that you won't like, and the best thing you can do is get the good out of it.
I learned my lesson with astronomy. And next time I choose classes, I will be more careful about what I take. Obviously, I’m not going to like every class that I’m required to take, but I don’t think anything will ever top my experience with astronomy.
To avoid classes like this in the future, I'm passing along some information that was passed along to me.
1. Before you register for any of your classes, make sure you check out Rate My Professor for a description of what your class will be like and what the teachers are like. I should have definitely done that when I had the time.
2. Ask your friends if they’ve had any bad experiences with the classes that you are about to take. My friends warned me about astronomy, but I didn’t listen.
3. If it’s humanly impossible to pay attention in class, then make sure you’re getting As on your online quizzes; they really help out when it comes to your grade.
4. Bring your I-clickers — a lot of extra credit for just pushing a button!
When I was registering for classes this summer, I couldn’t decide between all the cool classes that I wanted to take. I distinctly remember trying to choose between French and German, art history and psychology, and of course, astronomy and chemistry.
I chose astronomy — big mistake.
On the first day of class, I was excited to go to astronomy. I couldn’t wait to learn about the planets and go to the observations to look at the stars. Even my parents kept talking about how much I was going to like that class. Well, as it turns out, they were wrong.
And so was I.
It turns out the material is not as exciting as I originally thought it would be and the class gets so bad that people actually leave in the middle of the lecture — something I later learned was normal in college.
Not even in high school did I ever have a class that would make me feel so sick minutes before it. The class that I disliked the most in high school was trigonometry... and even that wasn’t as bad as astronomy.
My trigonometry teacher at least tried to get us somewhat involved in the lecture. She would come up with geeky anecdotes about her weekend and she'd give us free candy during the holidays.
But I guess not everything is bad about my astronomy class — there's always going to be a class in your schedule that you won't like, and the best thing you can do is get the good out of it.
I learned my lesson with astronomy. And next time I choose classes, I will be more careful about what I take. Obviously, I’m not going to like every class that I’m required to take, but I don’t think anything will ever top my experience with astronomy.
To avoid classes like this in the future, I'm passing along some information that was passed along to me.
1. Before you register for any of your classes, make sure you check out Rate My Professor for a description of what your class will be like and what the teachers are like. I should have definitely done that when I had the time.
2. Ask your friends if they’ve had any bad experiences with the classes that you are about to take. My friends warned me about astronomy, but I didn’t listen.
3. If it’s humanly impossible to pay attention in class, then make sure you’re getting As on your online quizzes; they really help out when it comes to your grade.
4. Bring your I-clickers — a lot of extra credit for just pushing a button!
Thursday, November 8, 2007
The Stressful Life of a Freshman
10:00 a.m. - Wake up. I want to throw that alarm out of the window.
11:45 a.m. - The parking garage is full and I have 15 minutes to get to my French class. Je deteste le Francais!
2:00 p.m. - I haven’t eaten, I have a test in an hour and a deadline at 5 p.m. Goodbye Einstein’s.
3:30 p.m. - I hate my astronomy class.
5:00 p.m. - I’m stuck in traffic, I’m way past deadline and I haven’t thought about my new blog yet. I guess sleep is out the window tonight. Hello doubleshot espresso.
Whether you’re a freshman in college or whether you’re a grown adult with a spouse and kids, you’re more than likely to experience stress at some point of your life.
Lately, I’ve experienced an excessive amount of stress and I’m only 18 years old. I guess I should expect wrinkles and gray hairs, too.
I’ve never been a "calm" person. In high school, I used to stress out about pretty much everything - ranging from a test or a quiz to who I was sitting with in lunch if one of my friends was sick. Now that I’m in college, I seem to be a lot more stressed out than I used to, and I’m not even taking half the classes that I took in high school, nor am I waking up at 7 a.m. to go to class.
As it turns out, I’m not the only freshman — or student, for that matter — who’s leading the same kind of stressful life as I am. According to a recent study at UCLA in 2006, 30.2 percent of freshmen reported feeling stressed out and overwhelmed by all of their new responsibilities.
So what is going on with us students? College is supposed to be the greatest time of our lives. At the rate I’m going and with the stress that I’m dealing with on a daily basis, college feels like it will be the some of the worst years of my life.
There’s a lot more pressure to do everything 10 times better than in high school: to be a better student and to get a diploma that will hopefully get you somewhere with some kind of career. It seems as though some of us are taking it all a little bit too seriously and forgetting about actually enjoying college.
Sometimes I feel like I can’t even breathe without stressing out. When I don’t have a test that I have to study for, then I’m probably doing homework, and even if I don’t have homework, then I’m probably writing an article that is already past deadline.
Don’t get me wrong, though. I like most of my classes and I like learning the material that I’m taught, and I really do enjoy writing, whether it is for the University Press or for personal reasons. Unfortunately, I just don’t know how to manage my time, which leads me to stress out about everything.
That is the biggest problem with us freshmen: we don’t know how to manage time. Therefore, we’re more prone to stress than more than some upperclassmen who have probably already figured out the system of getting things done on time and not stressing out.
Nobody ever taught me how to manage stress. In high school, most students don’t deal with stress because they’re kids and they don’t really have a lot of things to worry about. But for college students, things are a little bit more realistic and we have to start thinking about our futures and careers. It’s not like we can just get a bad grade on a test, hope to do better on the next one and not really care about it.
Luckily for you, I’ve taken the liberty of jotting down some tips on how to deal with stress from Campus Blues — a Web site that focuses on helping students deal with stress or the "blues" from being away from home for the first time.
1. Exercise — There’s nothing better than going for a run around the park to forget about all your problems.
2. Listen to your favorite music — That’s right, submerge yourself in your favorite song and rock out as hard as you can.
3. Go to a ballgame and scream — Not only are you encouraging your favorite team, but you’re also getting some stress out of your system.
4. Play your favorite video game — It’s Wii time!
5. Make chocolate chip cookies (or just eat the dough) — Chocolate usually fixes everything, or at least it makes you feel a little better.
College is supposed to be fun, so don’t stress out about everything and try to balance your time. Otherwise, you’ll be bald by the time you’re 25 years old. I’m sure you don’t want that.
11:45 a.m. - The parking garage is full and I have 15 minutes to get to my French class. Je deteste le Francais!
2:00 p.m. - I haven’t eaten, I have a test in an hour and a deadline at 5 p.m. Goodbye Einstein’s.
3:30 p.m. - I hate my astronomy class.
5:00 p.m. - I’m stuck in traffic, I’m way past deadline and I haven’t thought about my new blog yet. I guess sleep is out the window tonight. Hello doubleshot espresso.
Whether you’re a freshman in college or whether you’re a grown adult with a spouse and kids, you’re more than likely to experience stress at some point of your life.
Lately, I’ve experienced an excessive amount of stress and I’m only 18 years old. I guess I should expect wrinkles and gray hairs, too.
I’ve never been a "calm" person. In high school, I used to stress out about pretty much everything - ranging from a test or a quiz to who I was sitting with in lunch if one of my friends was sick. Now that I’m in college, I seem to be a lot more stressed out than I used to, and I’m not even taking half the classes that I took in high school, nor am I waking up at 7 a.m. to go to class.
As it turns out, I’m not the only freshman — or student, for that matter — who’s leading the same kind of stressful life as I am. According to a recent study at UCLA in 2006, 30.2 percent of freshmen reported feeling stressed out and overwhelmed by all of their new responsibilities.
So what is going on with us students? College is supposed to be the greatest time of our lives. At the rate I’m going and with the stress that I’m dealing with on a daily basis, college feels like it will be the some of the worst years of my life.
There’s a lot more pressure to do everything 10 times better than in high school: to be a better student and to get a diploma that will hopefully get you somewhere with some kind of career. It seems as though some of us are taking it all a little bit too seriously and forgetting about actually enjoying college.
Sometimes I feel like I can’t even breathe without stressing out. When I don’t have a test that I have to study for, then I’m probably doing homework, and even if I don’t have homework, then I’m probably writing an article that is already past deadline.
Don’t get me wrong, though. I like most of my classes and I like learning the material that I’m taught, and I really do enjoy writing, whether it is for the University Press or for personal reasons. Unfortunately, I just don’t know how to manage my time, which leads me to stress out about everything.
That is the biggest problem with us freshmen: we don’t know how to manage time. Therefore, we’re more prone to stress than more than some upperclassmen who have probably already figured out the system of getting things done on time and not stressing out.
Nobody ever taught me how to manage stress. In high school, most students don’t deal with stress because they’re kids and they don’t really have a lot of things to worry about. But for college students, things are a little bit more realistic and we have to start thinking about our futures and careers. It’s not like we can just get a bad grade on a test, hope to do better on the next one and not really care about it.
Luckily for you, I’ve taken the liberty of jotting down some tips on how to deal with stress from Campus Blues — a Web site that focuses on helping students deal with stress or the "blues" from being away from home for the first time.
1. Exercise — There’s nothing better than going for a run around the park to forget about all your problems.
2. Listen to your favorite music — That’s right, submerge yourself in your favorite song and rock out as hard as you can.
3. Go to a ballgame and scream — Not only are you encouraging your favorite team, but you’re also getting some stress out of your system.
4. Play your favorite video game — It’s Wii time!
5. Make chocolate chip cookies (or just eat the dough) — Chocolate usually fixes everything, or at least it makes you feel a little better.
College is supposed to be fun, so don’t stress out about everything and try to balance your time. Otherwise, you’ll be bald by the time you’re 25 years old. I’m sure you don’t want that.
Saturday, November 3, 2007
Partyin' it Up
As a college student, the most fun that we get on a Friday night is going to a party at the nearest college dorm room or apartment. The worst part about Friday night parties, however, is the Saturday morning hangover. This seems to be a common problem that many freshmen encounter: not studying enough and partying too much.
As a freshman, I’ve noticed that I’m slowly becoming what society calls "a party girl." Not only because I’ve been frequenting Friday night parties for the past couple of weeks, but also because, for some reason, I just can’t stop going to them!
In high school, I was never a "party" anything. I went to one high school party, and that was only because my friend was dying to get her hands on some booze and nobody else wanted to drive. Go figure.
But now that I’m in college, I go to parties, clubs and anything that involves a social gathering every weekend. What happened to me in the couple of months that I’ve been here? I’m supposed to be studying... not partying!
In fact, us college kids deal with anything through partying and binge drinking. If you get an A on a test, you go out and party. If your significant other broke up with you, you go out and party. If you’re bored, you party. Whenever we find an excuse, we party. That’s just how some of us roll.
The problem is that partying not only affects your studies and your work, but it also affects your health. (Yes, there are things that are more important than Jell-O shots and playing beer pong.)
According to Healthy Minds, a Web site that specializes on talking about physical and mental health, young people between ages 18 and 25 have the highest percent of binge drinking with a shocking 38.7 percent.
Partying is fun, but how far is too far? It’s not fun waking up the next morning regretting things that you might have done while you were drunk. Or even worse, it’s not fun waking up the next morning without remembering what happened the night before. It's also not fun waking up on a random couch half naked with Sharpie drawings all over your body.
There has to be a balance between partying and school work. But most importantly, there has to be a balance between knowing how much your body can take and how much you drink. Just because you think it’s fun feeling a little dizzy and being completely careless for a couple of hours doesn't mean it's good for your body.
As much as I’m growing to like partying, I’m definitely trying to be careful in the way I carry myself at my social gatherings.
Partying is fun, but death isn’t.
If you’re becoming addicted to the party scene like I am, here are some tips to try to balance your school life with the party life:
1. If you really can’t wait to go that Friday night party, then work your butt off during the week and get your work done before the party! Nobody likes to work while hung over.
2. Try to limit your partying and beer pong play-offs to just one day per week, preferably a Friday or a Saturday night. Don’t pick random days in the week or you won’t be able to stay awake during class.
3. If you party hard, then work hard. Classes and books deserve your attention, too!
As a freshman, I’ve noticed that I’m slowly becoming what society calls "a party girl." Not only because I’ve been frequenting Friday night parties for the past couple of weeks, but also because, for some reason, I just can’t stop going to them!
In high school, I was never a "party" anything. I went to one high school party, and that was only because my friend was dying to get her hands on some booze and nobody else wanted to drive. Go figure.
But now that I’m in college, I go to parties, clubs and anything that involves a social gathering every weekend. What happened to me in the couple of months that I’ve been here? I’m supposed to be studying... not partying!
In fact, us college kids deal with anything through partying and binge drinking. If you get an A on a test, you go out and party. If your significant other broke up with you, you go out and party. If you’re bored, you party. Whenever we find an excuse, we party. That’s just how some of us roll.
The problem is that partying not only affects your studies and your work, but it also affects your health. (Yes, there are things that are more important than Jell-O shots and playing beer pong.)
According to Healthy Minds, a Web site that specializes on talking about physical and mental health, young people between ages 18 and 25 have the highest percent of binge drinking with a shocking 38.7 percent.
Partying is fun, but how far is too far? It’s not fun waking up the next morning regretting things that you might have done while you were drunk. Or even worse, it’s not fun waking up the next morning without remembering what happened the night before. It's also not fun waking up on a random couch half naked with Sharpie drawings all over your body.
There has to be a balance between partying and school work. But most importantly, there has to be a balance between knowing how much your body can take and how much you drink. Just because you think it’s fun feeling a little dizzy and being completely careless for a couple of hours doesn't mean it's good for your body.
As much as I’m growing to like partying, I’m definitely trying to be careful in the way I carry myself at my social gatherings.
Partying is fun, but death isn’t.
If you’re becoming addicted to the party scene like I am, here are some tips to try to balance your school life with the party life:
1. If you really can’t wait to go that Friday night party, then work your butt off during the week and get your work done before the party! Nobody likes to work while hung over.
2. Try to limit your partying and beer pong play-offs to just one day per week, preferably a Friday or a Saturday night. Don’t pick random days in the week or you won’t be able to stay awake during class.
3. If you party hard, then work hard. Classes and books deserve your attention, too!
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