The Pros and Cons of Rooming with your Best Friend You’ve known each other since the third grade. You’ve done everything together through elementary, junior high and high school. You’ve laughed, cried, and even gotten in trouble together. Now that you’re about to graduate high school and head off to college, it would only seem natural to room together, right? Before you make that seemingly easy decision, there are a few things to consider. Just because you’ve spent so much time together over the years doesn’t mean that living together would be a smooth transition.
The Case Against As you begin your college career, you want to make sure and protect the friendship you’ve had. It’s pretty incredible to see how much can drive you crazy about a person when you live with them. These are things that never came out before because you were only together a few hours a day, rather than all day and all night. You don’t want to have your friendship ruined because you get annoyed with each other’s habits and start arguing all the time. College is a big enough change for you, and you need to maintain that great relationship you’ve had with your best friend. You’ve had a lot of fun over the years, and living with your best friend as college roommates can be very fun as well. However, it could prove to be a detriment as well. If the two of you are always together, it may make it harder to study and excel in your courses. Also, you might prevent yourselves from broadening your horizons and increasing your circle of friends. College should be a time when you are meeting and establishing relationships with people from different places. This will help you greatly as you prepare for professional life ahead. Don’t fence yourselves in from some potential experiences that can enrich your lives and lead to success down the road. If you each lived with new roommates, for example, you’d have a chance to really expand your group of friends and enjoy your time in college together.
The Case For Since you have established strong bonds with your best friend over the years, the potential pitfalls of living together as college roommates could definitely be
avoided. It could actually help you learn even more about each other and strengthen your relationship. Also, having a strong and proven support person alongside you as you embark on college life can have many benefits. The key will be to set ground rules and even goals. If you both understand going into your time as roommates the need to make new friends and get out of your comfort zones, you’ll push each other to do so. One important thing to avoid is taking the same classes, just for the sake of being together. You should find the program that you’re each most interested in. For example, you might be interested in business administration, accounting or property management, while your best friend is interested in event planning, new media marketing, or programming. Focus on your future first, rather than the comfort zone of always being with your best friend. College America provides programs to achieve degrees that will prepare you for a successful career. Contact us today to learn more. Photo Credit: maveric2003,