Dorm Life: An Essential College Experience

By J.M. Patin

Moving away from home can be scary for a degree-seeking freshman. Starting a new university is often nerve-racking enough, but coupling it with moving into a dorm leaves many students wondering if this college idea is all it's cracked up to be.

If you let it, living on campus can be a great experience. It's convenient, cost effective, and can be great for your social life. When you live on campus, you're minutes away from all of your classes, sources of food, as well as entertainment. You won't have to wake up extremely early for those 8:00 am classes and when you're bored or hungry, you won't have to lose a valuable parking space to satisfy your needs!

While living on campus isn't free, it's a lot cheaper than renting an apartment. Everybody knows college students are stereotypically poor, but you can be significantly less so if you're not spending all your cash on rent and utility bills! Not only will you forgo monthly housing payments, but it's very likely that your university will include a meal plan with your housing fees. This means not going hungry when you accidentally spend all your cash the weekend after you got paid!

Lastly, living on campus will force you to spend time with other people, if even it's just your roommate. This is a great way to make new friends and learn about others. College is a time for getting to know yourself and there's no better way to do that than to learn from others. And there's no better way to learn about others than to live with them!

On-campus living does come with a few sacrifices, however. Since there are so many people living there, you will most likely be required to follow certain rules (no guests after a certain time, no pets, curfews, etc). If you're leaving home for the first time and expecting complete freedom, this can be a bit of a buzz kill, but once you get into your studies, chances are good that you won't even notice that they're there.

Another drawback of living on campus is that there is often way less space in a room than you are used to. While you will have necessities like your own bed and closet, you may have to share a hall bathroom. You will also have to learn to organize and share space. Dorm life is almost definitely going to cost you privacy, but this can be helped by talking with your roommate and agreeing on set 'alone' times.

Hopefully, these drawbacks won't scare you off. Dorm life should be a part of every traditional degree seeking student's college experience. It may help you to stay focused on attaining your degree or it may distract you with all of the people. The key is to find a happy medium between concentrating on your studies and having a little a fun.

About the Author:

0 comments:

Guides Complete