Chief Delphi - What do you wish you had known when starting college?

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Re: What do you wish you had known when starting college?

Quote:

Originally Posted by GaryV1188

Privacy concerns lead colleges and universities to communicate directly with the student, leaving the parent out of the loop. (Except to send the tuition bill, of course!)

Stupidest rule ever!!!

And I'm not saying that so my parents can be nosey, and see what I'm passing and failing, but I have been too busy to do some stuff form time to time going through college, and wanted my parents to take care of some paperwork for me.

They agreed, and the college was very adamant on stopping them from helping me.

I think there is something wrong with that picture.

Colleges need to take in the fact that, yes.. you are a college student and you want some privacy being on your own for possibly the first time in my life for an extended period of time, but they also need to realize a student's needs to have that safety net (parents) who need to be involved with your college life from time to time.

And no, not just to pay for it. That is not the only time a college, student, and parent should get together on the same issue.

I will proudly state that all (8 years :eek: )of my tuition costs (minus one year for a grant) have come out of my own pocket.

So, in other words, my college has had no connection to my parents in my case, which is a really stupid thing in my opinion.

<cynical>
So, kids.. in closing, if you are in that stage of life and you want your parents to butt out of your life when you get into college, just do what I did, and pay for it yourself.

That's the only legal, and true way to keep things from your parents apparently!!!
</cynical> :rolleyes: :rolleyes:

Re: What do you wish you had known when starting college?

Quote:

Originally Posted by Elgin Clock

Colleges need to take in the fact that, yes.. you are a college student and you want some privacy being on your own for possibly the first time in my life for an extended period of time, but they also need to realize a student's needs to have that safety net (parents) who need to be involved with your college life from time to time.

I'm not too sure about this. In college, I'd say that parental involvement was only a 50/50 affair. Having a safety nice is nice... but having parents swoop in and handle everything isn't good, either. And often the parents bungled it worse than the students would have.

I think if a student truly wants a parent to be able to be involved, that should be allowed. But allow students to keep some things from their parents as well (especially if the parents aren't paying for things).

Re: What do you wish you had known when starting college?

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They agreed, and the college was very adamant on stopping them from helping me.

Hehehe... I was still seventeen for two monthes in my freshman year of college. I couldn't do anything without them signing for it because I was still a minor.

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DON'T DO FIRST, if you can avoid it for at least your freshman year. I wish I would have followed my own advice. Two years running I've meant to take a laid back roll and just be sort of a consultant. Somehow my rookie team this year ended up building their robot in my garage. Yeah... Right... being in FIRST and taking a laid back approach? I imagine there are a lot of you out there reading this that are much more diligent and smarter than I but take my warning and be careful. It is extraordinarily difficult to keep your grades up while being fully involved with FIRST, make sure you balance your schedule and leave ample time for study. You do not want to bank your GPA on robot ship deadline. Also travelling to competition is a difficult strain on your time as well, 4 days of classes and missed assignments can be difficult to deal with. For example Nationals is on my final exam week this year.

It actually depends on your major. Ironically, freshman year in my college was the easiest year so far for EE. I was told multiple times that the grade level drops between these two years.

Quote:

GET SLEEP!!!! You think you're doing yourself a favor by doing an all night cram session, but in reality you would have done better on the exam if you stopped studying and got 8 hours of sleep. With a little experience, you will start to notice when your productivity starts to take a dive. As soon as you notice this, it's sleep time. Set your alarm for 8 hours from now and resume studying after sleeping.

I was knew someone who actually fell asleep during the finals. It wasn't a pretty sight.

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Thats crazy! Banks know they can get more money from people in debt than those with money... it sucks.

Actually, this has to do with the credit rating more than anything. It has more to do with the fact that a person with no debt/no history of bill paying is an unknown quanity to the credit rating company. How do you establishes your credit rating?? Paying off bills. You can actually get a credit rating just by having the cable bill/telephone bill in your name and paying it off.