YOUNG VOICE
10 tips for college
Highschool. They say it’s supposed to be the most rewinded in anyone’s playlist of memories. There’s the eternal Monday and Friday flag ceremonies, the junior-senior rivalry during Intramurals week, United Nations month, English week, Math and Science days and the paparazzi-worthy JS prom. Remember those “subject rituals” you have to go through: dissecting poor helpless toads in Biology (may their croaky souls be at peace), presenting plays for Ibong Adarna and Florante at Laura for Filipino, mastering the art of using a protractor and a compass in Geometry and everybody’s favorite, watching the last few seconds of the school clock until recess, lunchbreak or dissmissal. You can’t forget the tweetum moments with your first M.U. It’s amazing, the mixture of broiling hormones and spicy teenage angst can make a colorful brew that is highschool.
It has been three years since I last wore above-the-ankle white school socks instead of skin-tone stockings. Three years since I last considered coffee breaks as recesses. Three years since I was last called by my teachers by my first name rather than keeping it uptight with Ms. Garcia. I once thought the transition from elementary to highschool was an immense shift. I was wrong. It was merely the case of sandos to baby bras. The turn over from high school to college was even surprising.
I write this column article with an intention to share pieces of advice and tips on what a highschool graduate might expect from the tagged “college life”.
1. When you enter college, you start from square one.
College is not a continuation of all the glory or defeat that was in highschool. Whether you’re the class valedictorian or the last in rank, trust me, the fuss about titles and honors will wear off after a few weeks of college. I graduated as class valedictorian in high school and quite frankly I thought I was something. It turned out my academic standing was simply deduced to having a free tuition for the first semester after acquiring an entrance scholarship. I was gulpsmacked with twenty-three other class valedictorians as my batchmates. It is impossible to brag about being academically proficient when your surrounded by a multitiude of scholars. The race was back at the starting line. All of us get equal chances.
2. More pressures and expectations.
In college, you will be molded and trained to become professionals. With this, your instructors and professors will treat you as adults. Yes, there may be free periods where you can go watch a movie or do videoke (like what I and my friends do) in between class hours that you barely do in highschool. But, your submissions, your requirements won’t be as simple as your usual three-paragraph essays. Say hello to theses, investigaroy reports, laboratory manuals, proposals and case presentations.
3. Brace yourselves for the fruit basket of instructors.
No not all instructors are fruit-loving. But teachers in college have a wider array of personalities. Either more considerate , more approaching, more erratic or more critical than the noble high school teachers.
4. Cheating is still prohibited.
The common notion of students entering college is that they get more freedom to copy off someone during exams. “Aanhin mo pa ang libro kung scholar ang katabi mo?” Have a little bit of concern for your future clients, customers, patients. They deserve more than a cheating moron for their nurse, doctor, engineer, accountant, etc.
Integrity is vital for a professional. This is how you gain your client’s trust. Integrity is the daughter of Honesty.
5. If you could not pick the course you love, just learn to love your course.
A lot of students who shift from one course to another have a common rationale as to why they become nomadic. Their hearts don’t belong to the previous course. But now, seeing the common practice of parents “brainwashing” their children to take up an in demand course (but don’t get me wrong our parents do this for our future, for a better life for all of us), you as a good student and an obedient child must simply train your heart to belong to the course instead of the other way around.
6. Girls, practice wearing 1 ½ to 2 inch heels. Provide yourself with an advance stock of a weeks-worth of band-aid. You’ll need them for blisters all around your feet. Boys, haircut please.
7. Be aware of Student Affairs. Know your duties, obligations, rights and privileges. Know your university president, your dean, your instructors. How? Read bulletin boards. Browse your university handbook. Yes, you paid for them, might as well read them.
8. Don’t pretend as if you know everything or as if you have everything. You may think it’s a way to earn new friends, but it’s not. Find what’s common between you and them.
9. Review for the entrance exam. But do not make the entrance standing be the parameters for success. I ranked 59th in our entrance examination. But just as what I’ve mention, back to square one. Who cares? By the end of my 2nd year, I ranked 1st. They call me the silent killer. (hahaha)
10. Enjoy. The last tip I can give but probably the most important one. Do not be bitter. But do not be careless. Remember being reckless is different from enjoying. A shot of Tanduay Ice is different from a Bottle of Vodka. Get it? An hour or two of Internet for Facebook or even DoTa is different from cutting classes to enter a DoTa tournament or chat with your cyber boyfriend.
To the new high school graduates, college is one heck of a journey. It will be fun, but just like high school, it will turn out to be what you make it to be. Study well and make your parents proud.
I’ll see you around the campus.
(Comments and reactions to reylangarcia@gmail.com)
