Short and Denney is a place to be artistic, to make friends, to hang out, to really experience life in a way that you haven’t before. Over the course of the posts, I have bragged about our classroom, the networking, and probably more than I care to admit. When it comes down to it… why should you really live here? It’s no skin off my back whether or not you decide to take a chance on a stranger’s advice.You should move here because if you don’t, others will.
It’s the sad truth of life. If you pass up on a great opportunity, someone will be there to catch where you went wrong. I’m also not claiming that STARS is the best residential college for you, although it is the best. If Hughes is a better fit, go for it, if you belong in EDGE, don’t hesitate. But be willing to join the community you think will be most likely to grow you and to make you a better version of yourself.
If we are being completely honest, I did not have friends the first semester of my freshman year, or at least not consistent friends. I was friends with a lot of upperclassmen who already had their own groups, circles, and lives, and so when I tried to join in a lot of times, I just felt left out. I struggled with anxiety and depression until kind of making friends with some people from Short and Denney on accident at a neighborhood work project day. Going to that one event on that one day got me one friend that turned into twelve by the end of the week, and have been there for me ever since. I’m a cheese ball, we all know that by now, but let college mean something to you instead of being just something that you tried one time. My friends from freshman year still mean the world to me. (Go check out Michael’s Hughes post, he’ll vouch for me!)
If you need to crack down academically, decide to do it and we can help you. Need friends? There are two hundred people to choose from that are stuck in the same building as you. Need plans this weekend? So do three other people in your hall. This is a community because we made it a community. I am an Advocate which basically means I’m a live-in tutor and an upperclassman that knows how to help all the freshmen survive their first year with few or no regrets. I and the other four advocates sacrificed hours and hours of our time at the beginning of the year to just be available in the lobby or the classroom or to go to dinner just to make the freshman here believe that this building is a community before it is anything else. We spent unpaid hours striking up conversations with freshmen and getting them comfortable enough to come to us or even just to hang out in the lobby. It is a community because we work really hard to make it that way for you.
I wouldn’t push this hard on something I didn’t believe in. (If nothing else, do what I did in the first place and register for STARS because you want suite-style bathrooms instead of dealing with community showers.) To each her own, right?
One of the many perks of having friends down the hall and in your classes is late night trips to the park for a study break!
Speak Your Mind