We know high school is first but time flies and before you know it you are looking and applying for colleges or Universities. It might sound scary, trust me we have been through that but the experience is worth branching out and trying new things. 

We are students from the University of California, Santa Barbara. Some of us had to move far from home to attend this school and at first it sounded terrifying but once you get here everything just seems fun and new. 

Attending a new school is always hard because you wonder if you will find friends or if you’ll get home sick. You might have many questions about the college experience and we will try to answer some of the important ones.

We hope you look forward to listening to our experiences, and maybe find it a little helpful or encouraging. We are really excited to share Our insight of our college experience with you!

We also built a short photo album of our experience in our first quarter here, we hope you like it! https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/12hikOTwtCgGlcI3CfLbgQV7GlodIcdDbcNT8qOIdFK4/edit?usp=sharing

Our experience:

Lissette:

Hi! My name is Lissette, and I am a first year Global Studies major at UCSB. I am a local, so I did not move out like most people or am dorming. It has been a hell of a journey. 

I actually didn’t get accepted into UCSB outright, I was waitlisted and I didn’t think I was going to get off. Only one of all my classmates had been able to get in, and I was one of two waitlisted. At least I thought so, until my graduation day, when I was sitting in my graduation gown, and I received a notification, congratulating me on getting into UCSB.

I had always wanted to leave, but when I opened the email to confetti popping up on my phone’s screen, everything changed, I had a sudden urge and realized that this was my school. 

 I had a pretty rough start into college, and don’t have much social experience because I don’t dorm and have two jobs, so my experience is a bit limited in that sense, but I am excited for what is to come. 

When you hear and research about your future and universities in high school it is very exciting to think about what is to come and you try to imagine it, and think are familiar with the idea the more you learn about it; but oh being in college makes you realize how much different and exactly it is to what you thought, a very scary but refreshing feeling. 

When I came to my orientation I actually had only slept about three hours and so I was half awake, struggling to keep myself awake and as they explained what a section was and how it worked and how it was different compared to a lecture. 

I was very confused and I stuck to the schedule decided the day of orientation, practically all the leftovers, as all the classes were full by the time I tried adding them, but it actually wasn’t too bad. 

All my classes weren’t very hard. It was definitely a lot of work, and you are forced to be independent. I took a math class and a communications one, so it was all up to me to get the work done, and keep myself where I am supposed to be, unlike high school, where you are told what to do and expected to do it.

The nice thing about being a local/off campus, is that you go to school and come back like normal, so when you have free time, it is really nice. You have a lot of freedom, and  I am constantly exploring new things with my time. 

Some advice from my experience:

1. Take advantage of all your resources! But don’t overdo it!!! You guys are on a good path, you guys are taking AVID which ideally means you guys want to go to college. Take advantage of it, I was an AVID student myself, and it built a community for me. There is a lot of help out there, you just have to look for it 🙂 But also don’t commit to just academics, sometimes you get so sucked in it takes over your whole life.
2. Build study skills!!! You know how in AVID they make you take notes. It’s no joke, because of it, it is really easy for me to pay attention in lecture because I know how to follow along. In college you won’t have as much time to figure out how to study, because you will be more busy with other things. So i really suggest you guys find the way you guys work best earlier, what times work better for you, how do you keep yourself organized, how do you take notes or learn best?
3. Enjoy yourself!!! I’m not trying to scare you, but high school goes by super fast! I still remember my first day, and boy it went by in the blink of an eye. I wish i knew how fast before, but really I hope you can take advantage of your time, and take with you many experiences. Have fun, and do as much of what you like to do, four years will pass in no time!!

Demetrio: 

Hi, I’m Demetrio. I am a first year political science major at UCSB! I moved here from the Central Valley. Now that I am in college and have finished high school, I was looking back at my high school experience and thought about how you guys will soon be starting this exciting new chapter in life, so I thought it would be beneficial to give you some advice for what’s to come!

1. Don’t stretch yourself out too thin. When I was in high school, I wanted to take all the hard advanced courses my school had to offer because I thought that it would make my college applications stand out more, and even though that’s true, I wish I had taken a second and thought about what I could handle and what was ideal for me to take.
2. Try to find your passion in life early! High school is the time where you can explore freely what you want to do in life. Even though you still have time after high school to explore your future career options, knowing what you want to do ahead of time makes it a lot easier when it comes to trying to decide what colleges to apply to, the college application process, and deciding what classes you need to take in college. 
3. Cherish the high school days, they go by fast. If you haven’t already heard this a ton, you’re definitely going to hear once you actually start high school. I remember my teachers, parents, and even the highschool upperclassmen would always tell us to make the most of high school and be involved because before you know it, it’s going to be over! Looking back at that now, it is 100% true about how fast it went. So when you go to high school just remember to make the most of it, become involved, and have fun!

Now that I gave you my advice on highschool, I thought I would write about how my first year of college at UCSB has gone so far. 

The college transition was hard, going from living with your family all your life to moving to a new school all alone is tough. As time goes on though, slowly but surely you learn how to become more independent. Then with the more time you spend here you start to get more comfortable with the college life as you make more friends and start to explore your interests

. 

One of the bigger things  I noticed in college was how independent we have to be in our studies. In highschool and middle school, if you slack off you have a teacher who will encourage you to get back on track, but in college that is a different story. No one here is going to bug you to turn in that assignment or push you to do better. It is pretty much up to you to want to learn and push yourself to do better. 

Overall, I am glad that I moved away for college. It is a new and exciting experience anyone can benefit from!

Jayleen:

Hello, My name is Jayleen and I am a first year Pre-Bio student at Ucsb. I am 18 years old and I moved here from El centro,California, my hometown is 6 hours south from here. When I first started looking for colleges to attend, I knew I wanted to leave home and go far to explore on my own. Don’t get me wrong, staying home and  attending community college was one of my options but I knew I wanted to challenge myself and the major I wanted to study was not available there. 

I got very lucky with the financial help I got and my parents were very supportive and helped me pay the fees. Being a Hispanic and going to a school farther up scared me because I have always been surrounded with people with similar backgrounds as me. Move-in day was hectic, lots of new faces moving in and meeting your roommates. Week 0 was so much fun the school had lots of activities and it gave us a chance to make friends. 

The diversity in this school is so much bigger than I imagined. I meet so many people that are hispanic and other people with different backgrounds that I am friends with. Two things that I learned so far was that there  is always time for everything and also don’t expect everything to come out perfect. A mistake I made was not focusing too much on classes in the first quarter because I was trying to make friends and socialize but I think I’m getting the hang of it, to balance life with school. I can’t say that you will come in and do okay because everyone’s experience is different, just go with the flow and if you do make a mistake learn from it.