I am off to go to college in early August, and I was wondering if anyone had any tips for an incoming freshman. I already don't plan on partying my ass off or some other crazy shit like that. But what are some tips for surviving the college life?

Party your ass off dude, you're not going to be able to do it ten years down the line when you're stressing about cash. Get drunk, have fun.

And study I guess? That's what college/uni people do right?

Most students are procrastinators, but it adds to your stress level. Don't fall behind on your coursework. Actually go to classes too. There were a lot of people I knew that didn't go to their classes and got shit grades. I wonder why.

Enjoy your time there. It's easy to get carried away with the freedom of no longer living at home (if you're actually going to be living on campus). There's nothing wrong having a good time but don't let it affect the real reason you're there.

Im going into my Junior year and my advice would be to not feel obligated to party your ass off if you don't want to. So many people I know seem to think that it's a college rule that you have to get drunk and party every weekend. It's not. If you're there because you're really passionate about what you're studying like I am, chances are you're going to want to put as much time into your studies as you can. That is what you're PAYING to do after all. Also, time management is one of the absolute most useful skills to a college student. Don't procrastinate. Just don't.

Learn stuff. And not only from books and lectures.

I finished my freshman year this May, and although I'm transferring to a different school (largely size reasons, as well as the student culture), I do have some hopefully worthwhile advice.

1) You're there to learn. Some people don't like this fact, but by and large, whether it's your parents, yourself, or the school/state (scholarships), a LOT of money is being spent by someone for your education. It matters. That being said, whatever you study, commit to it. Look at it as a job, except perhaps not quite as mind-numbing. While I wouldn't recommend a specific major, pick something you're passionate about that'll make you actually WANT to go to class, study your ass off, et cetera.

2) Not negating anything I said previously, college does teach you a lot outside the classroom as well. You will probably have more freedom in college than at any point in your life. Use it wisely. Whether you choose to party or not party-- really, whatever you choose to do, make sure that's how YOU want to spend that time, as it's probably your most precious commodity while at college. tl;dr, time management is key.

3) Especially if you're going to a larger school (I'd say at least 10,000 students or more), get involved in clubs. I know this may seem like trite advice you've probably heard already, but it's a really good idea to find your bearings early on. Again, just find groups/clubs you're interested in. It's usually not that hard at most schools, even the smaller ones.

That's about it. Watch out for snakes, as well. I mean, I've never had any issues, but you never know...

If your school is anything like mine was (University of Iowa), it's going to have about 300 supposedly mandatory orientation programs that assume you have the common sense of a 2-year-old. Skip them.

This seems to be more endemic to large public universities, though.

My college is pretty small so the parties around here are kinda lame, but definitely go to college parties because you need the experience and you'll never be able to do it again once you graduate.
Also, microwaves are your best friends. You'll learn to cook anything and everything by nuking it.
Get to know your professors because they can network for you and the more they like you, the more they're willing to do for you (curve your grades, help you, etc etc).

But the biggest thing: do your work and get good grades, but have a good time because you've only got four years.

Plan your future classes carefully. I've just gotten my AA and I'm finishing my last credits over the summer before I transfer. While I'm grateful for a lot of classes I've taken, there's been others I've wanted so badly but never got because I didn't plan carefully enough or didn't advance enough in a required class to earn it.

Also if your at a community college, go ahead and plan now for the college you wish to attend if you want to go onto a four year. Unless you want a major university that has a program known for making the best in your preferred profession, I'd advice looking inside the state for colleges and universities since transfer credits tend to work better when transferring in state.

assuming you are going to move out of your house, don't let stuff rot in the fridge(seriously), try to eat more than canned tuna, coffee and vodka everyday because you will be falling apart by the end of the year
make sure you are studying something you really want to, might want to seem obvious, but along the course you might realize its not really what you were looking for, and believe me, it's not worth to keep studying your ass off for years about a subject you are not passionate.

Thanks for the advice you guys. Some of it is helpful. BTW does anyone know if there is even a metal scene in Starkville,Ms? I'm going to MSU and was wondering whether or not they've got anything going on around there.

Same situation for me currently. I have mixed feelings about the whole thing, but I'll try to look on the positive side. At least I don't have to put myself in debt to go through college...

I literally don't have a single friend who graduated in only four years. Most people take between 5-7, these days, so long as it's a university that charges by the class rather than the year.

Me and most people I know graduated in 4 years. It's not uncommon to take longer than that, but 4 years is still the basic standard.

Definitely this. University (at least mine) tends to have great parties and it's really one of the best ways to meet people. Try hard in school too of course and try not to procrastinate. Procrastination is definitely my biggest problem at school.

There was one year when I took 2 classes. That's it, and just so I could have fun, party, etc. I had one class one quarter, another class another quarter, and I dropped the third class for the third quarter and took nothing. It put me back quite a bit in terms of timing, so I'm now in my fourth year of college and I still need another to go (I had to skip my first year out of high school because of boot camp).

My advice, don't do ^.

I don't know one person who's been in university for more than four years unless they've fucked up their grades or didn't take enough classes for their major/minor. But even then, they only go back for one semester.

It may not seem like I'm directly answering your question at first, but bare with it. This is what worked for me...


Honestly, I think the best thing I ever did for college was take a break.

I b-lined it to finish my Associate's ASAP at my local community college. Then, I moved out of my parents' house, got an apartment, worked 70 hours a week, etc, and tried to figure out where to go from there. I wasn't a "lost puppy" like so many post high school Americans are these days, I knew what ballpark I wanted to end up in as far as a career path, but I was trying to play it a little safe and really get a better grasp on what I was good at, where I wanted to go, etc. I was only 19 still, so I figured I had time.

Well, two years later, after busting my balls constantly and getting a better taste for how the world works, I decided I needed to finally take a stab at finishing up school or just take up some better-paying blue collar work (which I could have easily picked up, but I kept telling myself I'd never go back to school if I did it). A bunch of other things started to fall apart in my life, and I knew I couldn't wait any longer.

After all of that, I transferred to a school a few hundred miles away, and have had the best time and the best grades ever. The perspective I got really helped me attack school with a lot more purpose and clear direction. Being slightly older and a lot more pragmatic than my classmates got me the respect of a lot of my professors. Show them you mean business, look at your work as a job, and don't fucking procrastinate. They'll bend over backwards for you if you just talk to them as another adult and act like one. That's a big tip right there: look at your professors as fellow adults rather than somebody in a master position. It will make shit so much easier.

This is your time to network. Rock that shit, use your professors' connections, and make sure you explore beyond your campus for immersion within your chosen field. This includes making a hobby out of something related to what you're doing. For example: Are you an English student? Start a blog to share some creative writing. Honestly, blog about any topic you're in school for, and tie that in with your networking so that you're not just another face, but have something to push or something for people to actually engage with when they're on their own. Become a brand. A brand based on what you really want to do with your life.

I also highly recommend having a job while you're in school, unless you're on a sports team. For one, it's a boogeyman reason to get extensions on assignments that a lot of teachers will respect. Second reason's obvious: it's good to have money. And third, it will force you to be better with your time management while being far more constructive than any stupid seminars or intro classes can ever be. It's easier to learn time management when you have less time and have no choice but to manage it more effectively. Almost every person I know in school that has a job does significantly better. And, if you work a half-decent amount, classwork will start to look like a joke, and you'll get a lot more out of school when your mundane pre-recs or pain in the ass lab assignments/projects are just an afterthought. Tread carefully, though. You don't want to be too burnt out to get anything from the enjoyable or informative lectures and activities.


Oh, hey, I forgot to mention a big one:
Deliberately make time for your friends, and get out to the bar/party every once in a while. While it may seem like I'm advocating a hard-ass way of going about college (because I totally am), you should still make time for social experimentation and fun-particularly with whatever group of friends you end up making. If you're really busting your balls and feel like you could use a breather, you should probably take it. Friends are your anchor to sanity sometimes, just try to keep out of college drama as best you can (though it's admittedly somewhat unavoidable every once in a great while). However, I'd discourage the usual underclassman behavior I witness-wherein any moment you're not in class, you're with your friends. I'm much more of an advocate of the occasional solid adventure/crazy idea as opposed to the "chill out and get high/play League of Legends (or Magic, or Skyrim, or CoD) as soon as you're done for the day, go to the bar when the sun goes down" lifestyle. It makes the time with your friends far more rewarding, and makes for less distractions-which are the bane of college students.

Also, as far as social situations go, a lot of dudes (sorry ladies, but I don't know what it's like to be one of you) will spend a lot of their weekend nights looking to score. Please do yourself a favor and don't fall into this trap unless you're really good at separating your sex life from your personal life. I guarantee if you just stick to making your own life better and being good to your friends, the right kind of ladies will gravitate towards you, and they often don't bring the kind of drama your garden variety biddie will try to wreck you with.

If there's more on how to be a bitter old man in college that I can think of, I'll add it later.

Here's another bit of advice. If you can, take Integrated Studies courses. I have taken one last quarter called Race, Class, Sex and Gender and I can't tell you how rewarding it was. I learned about prejudices on all four subjects, re-evaluated my own look on things and gained friends through the class. Not just that, I also gained credits in drama, politics and psychology, all from one class. I'm transferring to Evergreen State College in September, up in Olympia. The college is almost all Integrated Studies, and I've registered for a class where I'll be learning film, creative writing, Greek Epics, literature and media.

Again, I highly recommend it if your college or university does it and have classes related to your major. It's a far more improved and welcoming form of learning, as well as offering a wider range of education mixed with your major.

Find a field that pays well with only a four-year undergraduate degree. Go to parties, have fun, be safe. And if you thought you made some bad friend choices in high school, well, make sure to learn from that when choosing the sort of people you want to hang out with in college.






Honestly, I think for about 95% of people, an undergraduate degree in the U.S. is a tragically expensive waste of time. With the exception of a few specific fields, an undergraduate diploma is worthless for everything except getting into grad school, so if you don't already know what you want to do with grad school then wait a while before you go to college.

I think the average in the U.S. right now is in the vicinity of 5 years, plus or minus one semester. Which isn't surprising, since it's so damn expensive. Schools have an incentive to keep people there longer and keep them paying.

Thank you for the effort you put into this post. I'll keep everything written here in mind.

Well, that's [one] problem of the education system here. I don't understand why we should have to pay for education...

You don't have to party to have a good time at college, but god whatever you do, don't stay at home with your parents. Please for the sake of humanity don't do it...

My source for this piece of information is experience

Okay, I actually might have something else to contribute. The work really isn't that much harder than in high school, it just takes a bit longer, but your time spent in classes is usually shorter anyways. I found college to be generally stress free. Again, the only issue with me is that I lived far from campus, making it a lot harder to have a social life with the people I went to school with. If I wasn't so passionate about practicing the guitar, or if I didn't have one at home I would probably have gone insane a long time ago.

Do LSD in nature.

I know right? Skipped all of mine(school starts in August) because of that reason, and because you have to pay about a HUNDRED DOLLARS for some of those camps.

When it's time to study or do homework or practice problems, just do it. As a math major, I've found it vitally helpful to do practice problems that come after each section of new material, whether or not it is actually assigned and whether or not it is graded or not. Practice and study.

Go to class. I've seen so many dumbasses who skip class 50% of the time or more, and then on test day they're bitching about how they have a shitty grade and how they know they're going to fail the upcoming test. It's amazing that they can't put 2 and 2 together.

I can't say much about college social life, since I still live at home, drive to and from campus, and generally am only on campus to either go to class or do homework/study for a few hours after my last class ends before heading home. I have a made a few friendly acquaintances at college that I can get along with well enough to study with and such, but nothing in the way of "new friends". That's just not high on my priority list. If you're social, by all means peruse that route, but always remember that in the end, you're there to learn and do well academically and get some sort of degree. Don't let anything else become priority or take over.

Some days will consist of nothing but class and then homework/studying from 8 AM to 10 PM with maybe a few moments of downtime, and you must accept that. Commit yourself, go after something you're passionate about, and stay focused. It's all worth it when you get back those A and B assignments. I've made the Dean's list (all A's) 3 out of 4 semesters, and I assure you that doesn't just come from generally being smart.

Here's a tip, quit.

His soul has apparently be devoured. Farewell. Also, this post was written by a dude who joined the Marines while he was still an high schooler.

I did this all the time and still came out with a 3.4, but we can't all be as awesome as me. (maybe it would be a 3.8+ if I'd been less lazy)

I did the same. I skipped about 30% of my classes last year and I still graduated with the dutch counterpart of a B+. To be fair, I was already familair with a large portion of the curriculum.

Make sure your teachers know you: ask questions in tutorials (not in lectures - don't be that guy) and visit them during their office hours to get advice on essays, etc. If they know you and remember your name and face, they are more likely to grade your papers favourably. If you've not said a word to them the entire year, they will tend to think you're not putting in as much effort and grade you accordingly.

And as obvious as it is, despite certain kids (like past-me) being oblivious, those teachers can really help you improve your work. Who would have thunk it, eh?

Do the teachers in the US actually grade you for how you behave in class? Isn't that a little ambiguous? What if you're just a quiet person in the first place and you prefer to figure things out in your own time? It also seems to encourage sucking up to the teachers. In the netherlands they only grade you accordingly to your actual test results. Is this really true or am I just being stoopid?

Ok I am being stupid because quickbeam is from the netherlands himself......

Hey henkkjelle. All is not as it seems. I studied in Scotland; although, now that you mention it, I suppose my advice might be subject-related. In my study (philosophy) it's less about being 'right or wrong' as it is how you investigated, argued, etc. Different teachers can easily award different grades to the same paper. If your teacher knows you as an inquisitive sort, you are more likely to get the benefit of the doubt than an anonymous student who's made no connection.

I understand that shyness may be an issue, but it's well worth the effort to go to the teacher during office hours (that's what they're for - they want their students to visit them) and, say, asking them to explain a certain argument one more time, in person.

Now that I'm in your country, by the way, I will be resuming my studies at UU this september. Very excited about it.

Hey congrats man!
I am currently going to a 6 year college (I get a Pharm.D and get to be called Dr. after graduating) and my school is only 1200 strong. So my perception of college might be a little different from other peoples.
But over the past 3 years I have learned the past few things:

1. GO TO CLASS. This is pretty self-explanatory.
2. Keep up on work and don't procrastinate. It is really easy to skip a week's worth of studying, but it is hard to catch up. Everyday for about an hour or two just go over what you learned that day. It will help you retain the information.
3. Go out to parties! You will meet some great people even though you don't drink (I didn't for my first 2 years and I still had a lot of fun).
4. I know I might get a lot of shit for this, but find a fraternity you like and join. I hated frats my first 2 years, but my third year I decided to. Probably one of my best decisions. You meet so many people and plus we help each other out (school, girls, family, etc). However keep in mind there are those douche bags out there so keep a watchful eye if you are going to pledge.
5. Work out. I started working out in college and man it is a great stress reliever. Plus all the chick dig it
6. Join clubs/societies that pertain to what you wanna be when you grow up! This might give you an idea of what that area is like.
7. Don't understand something. Go ask the professor! They aren't going to judge you. You are there to learn so use all the resources you have.

I would say the biggest advice for me is GO TO CLASS. I know it's optional, but that's the biggest reason people seem to fail from my perspective.

But yeah, enjoy your time. I'll be a senior this coming year. Planning on grad school. In my opinion, the longer you stay in school the better. It's a time of growth! And the only opportunity you'll ever get (unless you're lucky enough to go back).

Adding to what everyone else said about not skipping class and being social and all that fun stuff, I'd suggest getting into a physical fitness routine of some kind: jog in the morning, jog at night, lift some weights, join an intramural sports league, whatever you desire. I started lifting weights casually during my fourth year (it took two more for me to graduate because I had skipped class and partied too much, and I really had had no idea what I was doing) and it dramatically changed how I felt about myself, my appearance, and my work ethic. Although college is painted to be an endless party filled with horny women and good times, it has its abysmal periods as well. Getting into a physical routine is very important for your well-being and an excellent anti-stress tool that only requires time and dedication. And it'll give you some solitude if you're moving into the dorms, which is a blessing after a few weeks of being stitched to your dorm mates' asses.

Really the only advice that I can offer is not to bitch about your workload, regardless of your major. Believe me, I'm not impressed by how much work you have

In my school, part of your grade for each class comes from the amount of class participation. Meaning argumentative hotheads like me will eat up the quiet introverts. And you know what? That's exactly how it is in real life, so they either learn the skill now forcibly, or never ever have it, ever. You may not LIKE to talk a lot, but in most fields it confers a huge advantage on you if you are vocally and linguistically superior than your peers, from my experience and observations. So just do it. In the words of Mr Vincent Kennedy Macmahon that Skinless adored enough to use as a sample..

LIFE SUCKS, AND THEN YOU DAAAAAIIII

I'm finishing up a class over the summer at my community college and I'll have my Associates in a couple weeks. Gonna be transferring to University of Illinois-Urbana/Champaign in about a month for Chemical Engineering. Academically I'm not concerned at all but I'm a bit nervous about meeting new people. I didn't want to live in dorms so I have an apartment off campus and almost everyone I know down there are people from high school I don't particularly care to get back in touch with. Anyone know if there's any sort of metal scene in downstate Illinois or anyone who goes to UIUC?