Going to College

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

I have to choose between two universities. . . I know which one is probably a better school, but it’s about 7 hours away from where most of my current high school friends are going. (A lot of them are going to my other choice, which is less than half an hour away from my hometown.) How did y’all deal with moving away from almost all of your friends? This is honestly a depressing thought to me.

Some other things I’ve been thinking about:

  1. Peanut butter on meat loaf is nowhere near as good as it sounds.
  2. She’s only 15. That’s illegal. And, for a brief time, I dated her older sister. Those laws are to protect me from underclass girls.
  3. Hot peppers and a cappuccino probably look good now, but you’ll pay later.
  4. I have superpowers.
  5. I don’t like television.

No, the last five items weren’t related to college. I just ended up posting them. Well, I’ve got a busy day, so I’ll get going.

-Neil

2

[dad’s voice]

Well, son, it’s up to you. Who’s to say you can’t move back to town after you graduate? The friends who are still your friends will welcome you back. They don’t stop being your friends just because you’re away for awhile.

[/dad’s voice]

Seriously, I did the same thing: moved away for a couple years, moved back, picked up the threads of their lives. No big deal, and I had stories of my own to tell them as well.

Moving away can be traumatic, however. You just gotta give yourself time to make the adjustment. It’ll come. Be patient.

3

I ll move abroad in two months (99,99 % sure) and I have already started being in a constant bye-bye mood.

You ll find new friends there and you can at least try to keep in contact with your old friends.
I guess it just depends on what is more important for you.
dodgy

4

The important thing is why are you going to college?

A) To learn cool stuff, discover myself, become ever better in the ways of the world and get a really nice job.

B) To hang with my friends, not get too homesick, and try to avoid as much upheaveal in this time of change as I possibly can.

Personally, I take choice A and ended up at a school six hours away that most of my high school would have problems finding on a map. (Its not that they don’t know Pittsburgh exists, its that they think of it as “east coast” and start by the Atlantic.) I’m one of a mere handful of people from my state there and my high school counselor could not recall anyone else ever going there. Ever.

But I love it. I love the program, I love the administration and I have found some good people there. For me, college is a time to grow up and find out who you are without the influences of family or old friends. I don’t understand why anyone would want to go to a school to surround themselves with only what they knew before. It was my time to get out of the nest, and I did.

I’m not you, make your own choices, but my advice si to base them on your goals. Your own goals, not anyone else’s. It your life, your responciblity, your credit, your blame will come out of it.

5

This school year was the first time I ever lived away from home. I don’t live that far away, but it’s a 4 hour drive. (6 when my mom drives it, 3 when my brother drives it)

It sucks not being able to see my friends regularly, but one thing has helped considerably: my computer. E-mail, ICQ, chatrooms, etc. have all helped me keep in touch with that tiny subset of the population I call my friends.

In response to your random observations:

  1. Considering how it sounds, that’s hard to believe.
  2. If there’s grass in the field play ball. (No, I didn’t actually say that. Moving along …)
  3. Wash that down with some bad lager and it’ll clean you out real good. Terrific way to cleanse one’s body in preparation for a holy ritual. (Or whatever.)
  4. Yeah, but can you play the spoons?
  5. Television has informed me that it doesn’t like you either.

Good luck with whatever you choose.

6

It’s up to you but I’d recommend going to the better college. I’m at university now quite a distance away from my home and I love it. You meet lots of new friends and of course you’ll keep your old friends.
By moving away you’ll have more independence and everyone I know who went to uni further away from their home has a great time. You’ll have the best of both worlds as you can always go home for the holidays and whenever you are there you’ll appreciate it all the more for going away.
Be brave and enjoy yourself.

7

Go watch “American Graffiti.” Might be a good lesson.

My suggestion is to leave those high-school buddies behind. In a year or two, you’ll have less in common with your buddies than you think. In a few more years, you’ll wonder why you ever hung out with them. They’ll still be stagnating in their hometown, while you have gone on to bigger and better things.

8

I’ve experienced both situations.

I did my first two years of university in my hometown in the States at a school many of my friends went to. Towards the end of those two years, we were all still friends, but we had grown apart, met other people, and weren’t nearly as close as we were in high school. We were taking different classes, working towards different degrees. It’s not like high school where you’re all assigned to the same class – chances are good you’ll all be interested in different things, and you’ll begin to gravitate towards the people in your classes because you’ll automatically have things in common, like what assignment is due next week, what were the notes for the lecture you missed, which essay are you doing, etc.

Anyway, I then moved abroad and have spent the past three years finishing my degree here in Scotland. I wasn’t completely alone, as I moved here to be with my (now) husband, but he works abroad 6 months of the year. As far as university goes, obviously I knew no one to begin with. I’m not an overly social person but I still managed to make friends and find people to talk to in class (mostly other foreign students). I even made one really good friend who was my bridesmaid when I got married last year. We get together frequently. And now that I’m graduating, I find that this friend of mine is the only reason I’d want to stay in this city. As much as I don’t want our friendship to end (and I hope it will somehow continue), I can’t stay indefinitely in a city I otherwise dislike.

Assuming you’ll be living on campus if you go to the first school (I’m not) you will have a much easier time of meeting people and making friends. A lot of people there will be in your situation and will be eager to meet people and make friends. And e-mail and online chatting are great ways of staying in touch with the people back home.

My take on it is that high school is over now. Don’t hold on to your past so tightly that it prevents you from going where you want to go. There is a whole world out there which extends far beyond your current experience. You and your friends will all have Internet access and e-mail accounts at whichever universities you attend; you will not be completely cut off from them. There will also be plenty of opportunity to visit home – TG, Xmas, spring break, summer vacation, etc. And if you do go to that first school and you hate it, you can always transfer back home. (Try to give it a year though, so you have time to settle in.)

Good luck in your decision, and cheer up! College is infinitely better than high school. You make your own schedule (think: all afternoon classes :)), take the courses which you find most interesting, choose the activities and events you attend, and get treated like a responsible, intelligent adult. It’ll be a fantastic experience. Enjoy it, and try to make the most of it!

9

Your old friends from high school will always be around. It’s not hard to keep in touch these days…e-mail, IM, etc. In fact, I am in a long distance relationship with a wonderful guy I met in college. He moved 1,162 miles away, but we talk everyday. You’ll be surprised how easily you will meet people in college and how close you’ll become to them. You should give that college a try. It’ll probably be a really good experience for you. :slight_smile:

10

I’m going to college in the fall, but quite honestly I didn’t face this choice… I have one friend, literally - my best friend since fifth grade, and we always knew we wouldn’t be going to the same college. She’s going to school in Connecticut, and I’m going to Mississippi.

How are we going to deal with it? I don’t know. Her semester starts earlier than mine, so when she moves on campus I’ll be going with her to lend moral support and an extra car to move stuff in. We’ll probably cry a lot. If she can get online we’ll be emailing each other at least once a week if not more. Other than that, who can say?

11

Go away to college. This way, you make new college friends, which (though this may be hard to believe) will probably be closer to you than your high school friends. (you’re living with them, afterall…) Then on breaks and during the summer, you’ll have your old gang together.

I stayed in my town, but only because it’s a pretty cool place to live. All of my friends, however, left and went away to school. It sucks, and I regret not doing the college thing earlier a bit. Go for it.

12

I think, other things being equal, one should go to the best college possible. It’s a credential that will follow you around for the rest of your life. It won’t make or break your future life, but the better “name” may open a few doors, may give you some extra cachet when needed, etc.

More important here is the chance to broaden yourself. Think what you’ll gain from meeting different people, from being that far away from your home and having the chance to start everything anew.

At 17, I pulled up stakes and moved 1200 miles away from my hometown to go to a college where I knew no one. It was hard to find the courage. There was not even anyone else from my STATE who went there. But it was a wonderful springboard to new and interesting things I’d never considered for myself before.

In contrast, over half my friends, most of my classmates, and my boyfriend stayed near home to attend the state universities. A good many of them branched out and tried new things, met new people, and really grew, but some of them just replicated their prior lives. College for them was high school with ashtrays. At my 10-year reunion, a lot of these latter types didn’t even show up (despite it being in the same town for them, when many others bought plane tickets to come back!) because they felt like they “hadn’t done anything” and didn’t have anything to talk about. They were probably overstating it, but truth be told, they did have less to share than the people who had joined the military, chosen a far-off college, or saw college (whichever college, hometown campus or not) as a chance to try new things and make new friends.

If you do end up going to the closer place, I strongly recommend that you try to make friends outside of your high school peer group. Don’t room together. Don’t take the same classes. You’ll always have each other to hang out with, but let yourselves each bring new people to the mix. My college roommate and her best friend from home both enrolled at the same place, but they vowed to each ask for different roommates. They figured they’d have many more friends that way, and they were right.

13

My advice? Go to the best school you can and be receptive to making new friends. You aren’t rejecting your old friends, just moving on just like they will be. Truth of the matter is you’ll all change a lot for the simple reason your circumstances have changed. That isn’t bad; it’s just the way it goes.

In high school everyone is pretty much trapped in close proximity. After graduation, whether college or work follows, everybody moves out into the broader world. Things will simply never be the same way they were in high school. Your good friends will be growing and expanding too.

Betcha some of your friends will stay friends through the changes. You’ll meet again, absorb the changes and ride with 'em, becoming as close as ever. But you’ll cheat yourself badly if you try to hang onto past ways too tightly. Some of the closest, dearest friends I have I met in college, even though we all felt distinctly out of place and alone at first. (That feeling only lasted a few weeks, btw.)

Sounds like you have a huge capacity for friendship so don’t limit yourself up front. Part of the closeness you’re mourning was due to the high school environment and that’s changed forever. Good friends ride out the changes through time and distance anyway, so it’s a losers bet to sacrifice wonderful new friends in hopes of trying to resist change that’s already happened.

Which is just my opinion but of course you know your own life and mind best. YMMV. (And all the best to you!)

Veb

14

I am one of only two Kentuckians currently attending my college. Ultimately, I think that it is better to be away from your high school friends, or at least it was for me. Not knowing anybody when you arrive forces you to establish new friendships right from the start. Because I had nothing to do and nobody to hang out with, I had to immerse myself in campus life to meet people. To that end, I tried playing new sports and activities (I eventually joined the ultimate frisbee team and chess team), and I wasn’t afraid to try breaking into new groups and talking to people who I had never met before. And I’ve kept in touch with the high school crowd, of course, and they’ll still be there when I get home (just one more week :slight_smile: ).

15

Go away to school! Away! Away!

Seriously. If you are away at school, you actually have a chance to learn about yourself without having that high school “what will they think” baggage hanging over you. You have an opportunity to make new friends, and with email and the internet, you’ll find out who stays in touch and who is truly worth keeping as a friend. You also will get more mail and care packages from parents who won’t drive 7 hours to see you, but would drive 1/2 an hour to bring you that sock that you left in your room. All in all, being away is a good thing.

However, you are right about possibly being lonely. Don’t worry about that, just go out there and have fun and be yourself. Join clubs, talk to people, keep the door to your dorm room open when you are in. Be nice and people will like you (also have power tools, because that helps).