Graduating from high school is a huge accomplishment that can easily be seen as a rite of passage. Once a child is out of high school, they are seen as an adult, but are they ready for the challenges of college? Besides the difficulty of living on their own and making their own choices, can the newly graduated handle the hurdles college classes present?
To tackle a myth about college, professors actually care, but the student has to talk to them. In high school, the teachers will call the student to discuss grades. This is drastically different in college where the professor expects the student to come to them. The professors do care about their students, but they are not the students’ babysitter. They, too, see the students as adults, but has anyone told graduates this? No. They are told that the professors don’t care.
Now, what is true is that the classes are harder, which is a given, but no one explains why. High School teachers hand out what feels like a million homework assignments. This provides students with plenty of chances to save their grades. College does not offer such generosity. Most classes have a small number of tests and a few papers on top of the final. New students may find this difficult to adjust to especially when the classes operate at a faster pace. Students are both relieved and stressed that a class will only last four months. They are relieved that these classes don’t last so long, but now they must cram an entire section of a field into 16 weeks. Sadly to say, this leads students to do something they never thought they would; ditch a class to do work for another.
It may sound strange, but it will occur. There will be a test, project, or paper due and the student must ditch a class to complete it or study. Ditching is seen negatively as it is a student missing important information, but in college, it is a necessity at times. Most students take five classes and work, and so there will come a day where the student runs out of time to finish something. It is okay to miss a few classes. The professors understand that life happens and will not make a show of a student missing a class.
The best advice to give to the newly graduated is to speak to their professors, keep track of their assignments, and to not stress about making it to every single class.
Members of the editorial and news staff of the Las Vegas Review-Journal were not involved in the creation of this content.