First Year of University

     Attention all high school seniors, first year college/university stents. and young adult’s waitng to start college. What's up? In this generation we are expected to dive right into college after finishing high school. But how easy is it when we are actually here. I am going to talk about college expectations vs reality for first year students. 

     I am currently a second year student at the University of the West Indies and my was first year something. Right after finishing high school I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life. Well had some ideas but I wasn’t sure where to start or which option to choose. So like many Americanised Caribbean student I decided to do SAT classes after get a good 1200 out of 1600 on my first and only attempt, so I decided not to study in America. After all ,those international tuition aren’t cheap. My next option was to work until I had saved up enough money to go to University, not that my parents couldn’t afford it but I still wanted time to decide what to do in college. Eventually I decided to do Nursing. I was excited. Finally I found a major to pursue. 

     Going into university my mind was focused on one thing and one thing only. Studying all day and night. Now I had never been the student to get straight As or be at the top of my class but this time I was determined to do exceptionally well while at uni (which is short for university). Since my home is four hours away of course I had to live on Campus. So being the conservative girl I am I decided to join the Mary Seacole hall (girls only). I came here with way more stuff than I needed. My closet was full and I honestly only wore the same four outfits throughout the school year. Before I came to UWI I told myself "Kish you are not going to be in any leadership position, just study, eat and sleep" but of course I signed up to be floor representative at the very first opportunity I got. 

     On hall they wanted us to participate or else we would be kicked off. In school they wanted to do well or else we would be kicked out. So here I am a 19 year old trying to be involved in extracurricular activates and do really good in school at the same time. Now if you’ve never been in this situation you might be thinking "oh well that's not too bad" but you so are wrong. I was like a chicken with no head trying to be focused on everything that I had going on ,along with being a lazy teenager. Lol. Well you know how it is when you have a lot of things to do but choose to sleep instead. Yeh that was me most of the time.

After completing my first semester with just a pass in school and being an ok floor reprehensive. I went into second year ready to get another chance at that 3.6 GPA once more. No more leadership positions, I told myself. But ofcourse, a few months later I ran for Block Reprehensive and here I am Dynamite Block Rep 2018/2019. 

To all the first years and first year students to be. Expectations are always different than the reality. During your first year of college try to figure out what works for you. Study in different environments and different times of the day until you find what works for you. Try new things and most importantly don’t forget why you came to university. Just Keep Going!!