I’m going to University in September, and I’ve the same old stories of how I’ll have no money (no change there) there will be very little sleep because of all the studying I will have to do.
So what can I look forward too when I go to University?
Yes, but this will be true for about everyone at a university. So you will have a lot of low-cost fun. Being poor is absolutely acceptable because, after all, you are the elite of tomorrow (well, some of you)
No, I can’t confirm that at all. Little sleep might be caused by social obligations but that’s a differnt story. However I had to switch the subject last year because I failed the wrong things at the wrong time. Perhaps I am not the one you should take advice from. (OTOH currently I have the best average in my year 
in my new subject)
The best time in your life. If not, there is something severely wrong.
From what I heard its just an overblown extension of college (I’m in the UK, so its like the last three years at a U.S high school) and that isn’t good because College to me is awful, its just really tedious, and if Uni is like that I don’t see the point in continuing, I’ve missed enough of my teenage years because of it already.
Ok, pehaps it is different here. I went to university after “Gymnasium” (last 9 of 13 years of school) and one year of civillian service. If I understood you right, then UK college is like an extension of school. That’s definitely not the case at university here.
I was going to start a thread for this but I’ll put it here with regards to this statement.
In high school I had plenty of friends and of those I’d say there are about 20 who I still in stay in very regular contact with, playing hockey twice a week, going out on weekends, etc. So I figured when I went to university I’d find more people who shared similiar interests with me. Long story short, and it is a very long story, after about 2 months I had met everyone in my building and hadn’t “connected” with a single one. I wasn’t a drunk nor rich enough to go drinking every Thursday, Friday and Saturday with the drunks, I wasn’t attractive enought to go clubbing every weekend and to bring home a different girl, I wasn’t enough of a pothead to hang out with them, I wasn’t enough of a nerd to sit around playing PS2 every weekend, I wasn’t punk enough to hang out with the punks, I was too big city to hang out with the small-town boys and I wasn’t athletic enough to hang out with jocks. Also, everyone who lives in the city where the university is, had absolutely no interest in making new friends, they still had there high school ones. There were no people from my hometown and no one from my ethnic background, two very easy ways to meet people.
All that I expected out of university was to meet people who I could discuss 21 Grams and the new Flaming Lips album with, could crack open a beer or two while watching the hockey game, discuss our fantasy sports pool, smoke a joint and relax to some Radiohead. Now that I’ve finished my 2nd year, I can honestly say I’ve met one person who I regularly talk to but even we don’t exactly have any of those above things in common. Luckilly for me, a friend of mine from high school also goes here. He kept me from going insane.
Another couple of days and I get to go back home with my “real” friends and I get to spend the summer with them and those will be the best time of my life since it doesn’t seem to be happening here.
OTOH, my sister is the exact opposite, in high school she only had a couple of “real” friends, she’s just finishing her first year and she’s moving to a house for 7, with 6 good friends.
Go in with good intentions and hopefully things will turn out better for you then they did for me.
Here’s my perspective: I hated high school (grades 9-12 in the US). My parents were very strict, so I never had a reasonable curfew (in my midnight on a weekend? My friends were just getting started at that time). I went to an all-girl Catholic school and picked up a severe wariness and distrust of other women (I’m feeling much better now, thanks). I wanted nothing more than to take the classes that I wanted to take, meet new, more intellectual people, and get away from my crazy family.
I got all those things at university, in spades. I made the best friends of my life there–they have utterly displaced my so-called friends from high school. I met amazing people, learned at the feet of gifted professors, and in general had the time of my life, all on my parents’ dime.
No, it wasn’t perfect; I picked a major I didn’t like and couldn’t get out of, so my first two academic years were very tough on me and hurt my GPA, but by my junior year, I was getting almost all B’s and above. I love the town where my university is located so much that still leave here 11 years later. Overall, I’d say going to college is one of the best, if not the best, thing I’ve done for myself in my life. I can’t say for certain that you’ll have the same experience, but hey, maybe you will. You should go and find out.
Frankly, there is little point in comparing high school/college to university, since you would usually follow either in a different period of your life. The alternative is not high school versus university, but university versus going to work directly. You will most likely not get good jobs, or will stay at a low level in the organization without a university degree. Furthermore having to work will probably mean you have even less opportunity to enjoy your years as a youngster. So if you have the opportunity for going to university you should take it.
That said, as the previous posters have said, it could be you like university less than high school. The reverse may happen too. The key is to find people who are agreeable to you. If they are not around in your subject, sign up for courses outside your subject which you like, or do other things you like (sports, theatre, whatever). Hanging on to your school buddies is the worst way to experience university (though I understand you may be forced to as a last resort). You should try to open up to new experiences: if you expect everyone to be like your previous friends, people will not open up to you either.
Kid_A, seriously I didn’t want to offend anyone. Of course the exact results will differ from person to person and you need a bit of luck. However I personally was overwhelmed by the potential that university offered me for my life.
I am certainly far from rich, I’m not attractive, clubbing is somewhat limited by the fact that I have no interest whatsoever in music and I don’t dance (apparently I was born that way) , I have never smoked a single joint (embarassing but true), I have never even touched a PS2 (I own an old IBM PS/2…), I am not a punk, lived only in medium-sized cities and I am certified unathletic (T7).
However my experience is that all those things mattered in school and miraculously this stopped as soon as I entered university. I know a very diverse group of wonderful people, some like me in some respects, many totally different. In school I had realtively few good friends. I was your picture book geek, shy and insecure. At my first university I had more friends than ever before and since I switched universities my circle of friends expanded expanded even more and keeps growing. And at both universities I had a very good time so far.
University student checking in.
You probably won’t have much money, but neither will the other students.
As for the work load, it depends on the course.
What can you look forward to? Trying new stuff, meeting new people and having great time.
I’m having a great time, and I’m sure you will too.
Sixth form, (which is a type of a college) is like an extention of school, but universities are not.
I posted this because of the actual slap in the face I got when I arrived at College, it was one of the biggest anti climaxs in my life, it made me think what was the point in continuing when it seemed the more higher I got up in my education, the less amount of friends were there with me.
Kid_A, that sounds awesome - you can be my friend anytime. Can I ask where you are? I am really surprised you haven’t met (m)any people who share your interests, since what you described is prototypical “college” (U.S.) stuff. Are there any student groups or clubs that you could join that might have people more your speed?
And hell, if it’s really worth it to you, it might not be too late to transfer. It sounds like maybe you’re an overly smart guy who went to a second tier school - am I wrong?
kellner, I wasn’t offended at all by what you said I just wanted to let the OP know that you have be prepared for the possibility the university isn’t all that you want it to be.
And my experience was the exact opposite. In my high school there were all these little groups and while I didn’t exactly fit in to any of them perfectly, I still got along great with everyone. Once I got to university all of the sudden these things seemed to matter a lot more to people. I know this is the exact opposite of everything I was ever told about school but I found people is university to be a lot more shallow then the people I knew in high school. People wouldn’t have anything to do with me because of where I grew up. Goddamned small town mentality. Girls couldn’t even go for breakfast in the morning without gobbing on the makeup and doing their hair. It’s 8:00 in the morning, everyone is either still asleep or too hungover to notice that your new shoes.
Plus the people who I thought were my friends in first few months ended up getting me trashed, I mean really trashed, blacked out trashed so they could take “inappropriate” photos of me while I was passed out. And this was as revenge for dancing with a girl who another guy had already claimed as his own even though she had no interest in him.
Let me just say the moral is:
Go to university open-minded and wanting to meet new people. It’s a brand new start for yourself, you can reform yourself into anything you want. Take the oppurtunity it’s worth a shot and I would recommend it to anyone in spite of what happened to me.
Unless you’re in full time engineering or mathematics courses i dont think you will be studying until 1am every night. Even then that might not happen.
Im in college, its not that great but it must just be me. Im not social so i don’t really benefit from all the partying.
I also have no money, but not having money isn’t that bad you just learn to stretch a dollar to the point where you don’t mind being somewhat poor.
Ding, ding. You nailed part of the problem right on the head. Since Grade 4, I was in the gifted program, part of the reason I’m so tight with my high school friends. In my final year of high school I had my sights set pretty high, Chemical Engineering at arguably Ontario’s second best university. After failing my Algebra mid-term, I pretty much gave up, my dreams had been destroyed and I went into a pretty bad depression, which culminated in a complete breakdown about a month before finals, I had fallen behind in numerous classes and my teachers’ finally confronted me about it. Surprisingly, I still got accepted into the chem. eng. at my first school, only to have them revoke at the beginning of August because they received summer school marks and I got bumped out. So I ended up here, Last Chance U. The worst rated university in Ontario. Aside from the people and the city, I really am enjoying the education part of it. For the first time in a while I’m actually excited about learning and am halfway done a degree in Environmental Engineering.
About transferring, if anyone knows anything about Ontario and the Double Cohort you can see why this is very difficult. Schools right now are packed with students due to the elimination of OAC(Grade 13), so both the OACs and Grade 12s both graduated last year.
Let me just say this about 21 Grams, I went to go see with 3 other people. They all agreed “It was too boring. Why did I spend ten bucks so I could read a book?” I guess there weren’t enough explosions for them. :rolleyes:
Ryan Liam, I apologize for the hijacks.
Cliche UK career-advice phrase - “you get out of univeristy what you put in”
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If you want a few years of parties, they’re there for the waiting
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If you want a solid education which will follow through to teacher training, a decent police job, an MBA, or Law Conversion (UK terms here), then work hard and you should be able to get there
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If you want to indulge in a fascination with the obscure topics that you never heard enough about in school, and want some credit from proving that you understand them, then university is the place for you.
I go to a state University now so I can tell you all about it…
Sleep: you will lose sleep at some times of the year… during finals etc you will be cramming more than you want to know so that you will do well, but it pays off and its rewarded. Other times, you stay up til 4AM then sleep til 3 in the afternoon then wake up and watch tv the rest of the day and not miss out on anything… ahh those are the great times
Food: It is great for about a month, then the dorm food sucks… its sad when you give up a meal to cook instant macaroni, so stock up on it. ramen noodles are also a great breakfast lunch or dinner.
the freshman 15: It is true, but you need to watch what you do… typically at universities, you get a free pass to the student gym or rec center. take advantage of this… its the only time in your life you get it for free.
University was one of the best times of my life.
Shame I only realised it after I graduated.
Yeah, but you will make new friends. Friends that will still be around when you’ve graduated and moved on. Heck, I made some of my closest friends at university, and I still talk to them, they’re still around etc. etc.
Where are you going, and what course are you doing?
Try and get into halls, in a shared flat, rather than a single room on a corridor.
You’ll meet more people that way.
Give yourself at least a year to get a proper circle of friends and settle in, it won’t happen overnight.
Don’t expect to make any really good friends in your classes, unless you’re doing something like Law, Engineering or Medicine, in which case you won’t know anyone OUTSIDE your classes!
It’s ok to miss lectures, spend whole days in bed, and do essays the night before they’re due…but only in the first year…you gotta get the head down early if you want a 1st or 2:1.
This is the only time in your life when every night is a Friday night, there’ll be so many parties/clubs/ late night sessions during the week that the concept of a weekend becomes meaningless.
At any given time of day or night, someone within a 50 metre radius of you is drunk, high on E or stoned. Learn not to notice.
It’s like school and college in that there are Jocks, Yahs, Goths, Nerds, Freaks etc. You’ll more or less know who you’ll be most comfortable around. DO NOT decide to re-invent yourself overnight as someone else. Doesn’t work.
Buy earplugs, for when your flatmates are too noisily amorous and you want to sleep.
Don’t join stupid societies in Fresher’s week. Join bigger clubs, with good hisotries and an established social network, not something tiny and new. Don’t join things you’re not interested in.
Take advantage of the free Gym. A diet of Pot Noodles, Lager, kebabs and toast is not good for the figure.
For the first few weeks be prepared to talk to anyone about anything, it’s the only way to make friends.