Feb. 27, 2019 | Midwestern State University | thewichitan.com | Your Campus. Your News. | Vol. 83 No. 20
Dasia Daniels, general business freshman and Ally Solete, special education freshman eating lunch.
PHOTO BY KARRINGTON BRADLEY | THE WICHITAN
Freshmen find adjusting to college life a challenge KARRINGTON BRADLEY REPORTER
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reshmen students are met with new obstacles which require adjustment. Firsttime students face struggles with making grades, starting friendships, and adjusting to being away from home.
GETTING USED TO CLASS
Landon Parks, exercise physiology freshman said, “It took me a couple weeks, maybe a month, to kind of get into the swing of things [and] realizing I need to be more aware of my time management.” Freshmen did not feel prepared coming into college. Dalton Drennan, pre-dental and biology
freshman, said, “Coming into college, I had a bunch of people tell me, ‘Oh it’s easy all you have to do is take notes and pay attention,’ but the homework… there’s so much homework but I didn’t have any homework, compared to this now, in high school.” First-time university students that came from smaller towns or high schools with smaller graduating class sizes took a while to get use to larger class attendance. Ally Solete, special education freshman said, “It was a big adjustment. I didn’t think it would be this hard. The classes definitely were bigger from the high school I graduated from. I graduated with a class of 47 and so being in these class sizes, one of my classes is literally the size of my graduating class and so it was a
big adjustment to get used to that.” Incoming students who have been concurrently enrolled in college courses during high school still felt the transition into university classes was tougher than they expected. Alyssa Vieth, general business freshman, in comparing dual credit to university level classes said, “It [dual credit] was a lot of easier. They didn’t really prepare me for this at all.” Other students said Advanced Placement classes from high school were different compared to university classes. Fatima Romo, radiology freshman, said, “In AP they [high school teachers] teach you based on what they think is on the test and they basically just want to teach you to pass the test but you don’t always learn the con-
tent as well.” Some students struggled with adjusting their study habits to match the course load of college classes. Tate Tomlan, radiology freshman, said, “I’ve had to study a lot more, pay attention a lot more and all that. It wasn’t anything like high school, no one is there to help you. It’s all on you.” In response to the added difficulty of university classes, various students adapted their learning practices to keep up with their school workload. Biggers said, “I got more organized. I actually use my planner. I have like a hourly schedule of what I am supposed to do and when I am supposed to do it see FRESHMEN pg. 5