I was extraordinarily excited for college. Leaving home to
experience a whole new state and dive head-first into a brand new community
intrigued me. I could not wait to attend new classes and still be able to nap
in the middle of the day. Furthermore, the new-found freedom college promises
fascinated me. I couldn't wait. Before I
left my parents told me countless times to “start strong” and “manage your time
well”. I tend to be a fairly confident individual,
thus I was convinced I would have absolutely no trouble immediately succeeding and
successfully managing my time.
I was wrong.
I quickly discovered that although the academics aren't overly
challenging yet, managing my academic and social obligations efficiently will
be tough. The college workload didn't surprise me. It was not too overwhelming
and I credit my high school in preparing me for this academic aspect. That
being said, I knew this was my first semester and had heard numerous times from
upperclassmen it was BY FAR the easiest year work-wise. It was imperative for
me to take advantage of the opportunity and earn the highest grades I could. The
combination of academics and social life was challenging though. In fact, extremely
challenging. I’m a fairly social person and the first 2 months I didn't understand
that sometimes I have to say no. My first couple grades came back and I was not
satisfied in the least bit. I knew I needed to sacrifice some of my social time
to concentrate more on academics. Luckily, I was able to recover and eventually
discover the proper amount of time I needed to complete school work.
I struggled with the same issue of attempting to balance between my social life and academic success when I began at TCU last semester, and still do at times. I often heard coming into college that you can only pick 2 of the following 3: Academic success, a social life, and sleep. While I believe this to be a bit exaggerated, I have found it to be true at times. Time management is the number one issue I've had since becoming a college student, as there is no one keeping on us track anymore like there was in high school. I also believe a lot of this academic pressure comes from the concept of grades. In our society all we focus on is grades, rather than actual learning and critical thinking. Dr. Williams and I discussed this a few days ago and I can't help but wonder how many times people do whatever they can to get the grade and end up not learning anything. I know I did many times in high school, because that's the way education is being perceived in our culture. The pressure is heightened even more being surrounded by honors students. Every class seems to be a competition to get the best grades. Rarely do you hear students discussing what they learned. These academic pressures we all feel are heightened due to the emphasis on grades rather than learning, and might actually hurt our social lives because we are worried about getting that 4.0 to be better than our peers, rather than worrying about spending time with the people in our life that we care about.
ReplyDeleteTime management is a a great skill to have. I'm jealous of the people that are just naturally great at balancing a million things in their life. Going to college 900 miles away seemed like a great idea to me, but after the first round of exams, I realized managing time was much easier at home. I definitely agree that high school was good preparation for the college work load, but back then I had help close by if I really needed it. College is a wake-up call because there really isn't anyone that will always be there to pull an all nighter with you or drive you somewhere so you don't have to walk. Knowing how big of an adjustment college is, it's important to cut yourself some slack. You made it in the honors college and stayed in it, so you must be doing something right.
ReplyDeleteI could not agree more that as a fellow freshman the biggest adjustment to college is learning how to manage your time. I had a similar situation in the sense that my high school prepared me well so I thought I knew how to handle my time, and also being a social person I sometimes chose social obligations over schoolwork. When my first grades came back I knew I had to make a change and find a new way to balance the two. Seems like you have learned a lot this year which is great!
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