<p>College is not highschool and that means no one cares if you eat alone, no one thinks you are weird if you ask if you can join them for lunch, no one cares if you aren't "cool" </p>
<p>and not everyone is "cliqued" up yet</p>
<p>and most everyone around you is new, a bit nervous and feels pretty much like you do</p>
<p>and noone knows anything about you or how you were 3 months ago- you have a fresh slate with new people and lots of opportunites</p>
<p>and once again, no one cares what you are wearing, what classes you are in, if you eat alone, if you like to study, so chill and learn and enjoy</p>
<p>Actually, life is pretty much like high school, except you have to work to put a roof on your head and food on the table and there are no more summer vacations.</p>
<p>There will always be shallow people.</p>
<p>There will always be people that care about what car you drive, what clothes you wear, how much money you make</p>
<p>Your physical attractiveness will always play a huge role in how many friends you have and it may also play a role in how many interviews/job offers you get.</p>
<p>If you are not funny and outgoing, you will still be ostracized by many of your peers.</p>
<p>Even adults are "clique-y"</p>
<p>...and the list goes on.</p>
<p>PEOPLE ARE PEOPLE. They were in high school, they will be as adults. There will be kind people, there will be evil people, there will be people in between, and there will be people that judge you and there will be people that dislike you and there will be people who think you are weird or have a vandetta against you. </p>
<p>The difference is, at each stage of your life you are given the prime opportunity to evaluate how much these people matter and how much effect they will have on how you live. So, going into college, expect there to be idiots who may think you're weird for asking to join them at lunch, and expect there will also be people who would love to have you and may become your best friends. But take those chances, be a kind person, and you'll be rewarded. Just as in high school, just as in any time in life.</p>
<p>yes, but I have found that people in college are alot more mature than people in HS. Honestly, though, no one does care if you are eating alone (I have plenty of friends, but I go to eat by myself often. sometimes my friends' schedules and mine don't synch up good. big deal). Rarely do people care what you wear as long as you aren't wearing gross, dirty, and/or seriously ripped up stuff (holes in the knee is one thing, holes all over the place including all over your shirt is another) then you should be fine. The best part about college is that (if you go to at least a moderately sized school) there WILL be people there who dress like you, like the same things you do, etc. Me and my really close friends were all the "outcast" type kids in HS, but we all have a great circle of buds. I am also definitely friends with some people now (met through an organization- not my really close friends) that I probably wouldn't have been friends with in HS (two ex-cheerleaders for example). People mature. Yes, there are still idiots in college, but there are those kind of people everywhere. There's just a much lower frequency than in high school because people tend to chill out and (USUALLY) realize the world does not, in fact, revolve around them.</p>
<p>people may ask about a class, but they don't judge you by it, it is a conversation starter</p>
<p>and in college you can usually not have to deal with the jerks, they have no power at all and they soon realize it because it doesn't impress anyone</p>
<p>umpc11 you missed the point entirely, in HS those people somehow have power and influence to naive HS kids, in college they are nothing to anyone, and as a college student, you don't need to care if you are eating alone</p>
<p>In HS they have power and influence? I didn't know ANYONE - who wasn't "in" that crowd to begin with - that paid any attention to the football players and cheerleaders at my school. They were there, there were a lot of them, and they were attractive, but whatever. In college there is also a large group of attractive pretty people (ah, Greek life!).</p>
<p>I hate it when people say college is not like HS. Sorry, but it's just a pet peeve of mine. I've sat around a group of adults and thought how HS they were, like consciously thought that. I really think the only thing about college is, like AUlostchick said, it's bigger so you meet more people like you, and eating alone at lunch isn't indicative of any social failure on your part, it's just like going to a coffee shop and eating alone.</p>
<p>I think it also depends on where you go to college. I think a lot of publics are more similar to high schools. There are considerable differences, but there are also considerable similarities.</p>
<p>"I think a lot of publics are more similar to high schools."</p>
<p>Nah. Especially not big publics. Well, I guess it is in the sense that there's a lot of people of varying intelligence and dedication (whereas maybe not SO much at Harvard or something), but to me that's more "real life" than HS, haha.</p>
<p>All of my friends (and practically everyone from my high school) went to OSU, they say it's like high school part 2, but this my be more of a reflection of who they choose to hang out with (i.e. their friends from high school) than the school itself. But I would expect a high school type environment at a school were you know a lot of people (and have known them for a large part of your life).</p>
<p>And I go to Harvard, and it is absolutely nothing like high school. I mean, everyone has their cliques and everything, but it just isn't like high school. It feels much more mature, the people just are not as judgemental.</p>
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All of my friends (and practically everyone from my high school) went to OSU, they say it's like high school part 2.
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<p>I've heard the same from U of I. And a lot of my friends say that they want to go to a private school just so they can avoid having to relive their high school days.</p>
<p>phuriku, it's actually funny that you mention that, because I used to live in Chicago (I moved to Ohio right before senior year of high school) and all my friends from Chicago/everyone from my Chicago high school all go to U of I. And whenever I see their facebook pictures or talk to them, it all seems very high shool and almost immature. They hang out with the same people do the same things (except this time with alcohol).</p>
<p>This probably explains why I'm not really close to many of my high school friends anymore...I went to Harvard and met so many different types people and changed A LOT, and they didn't really change at all.</p>
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And whenever I see their facebook pictures or talk to them, it all seems very high shool and almost immature. They hang out with the same people do the same things (except this time with alcohol).
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<p>exactly.People won't change so fast fundamentally once they get in college.</p>
<p>Yeah, most of the people in my high school went to the local community college, and pretty much yeah it's like high school part 2 there. I go to a public 4-year school which is pretty nearby (half an hour), but I very rarely hang out with many people from high school (basically just my best friend, and her roommates). I don't think I could stand those people much longer, because I was sick of them when we were still IN high school. All of my college friends are not from my hometown, and most of them are not even from my home state, which is nice because I love diversity and differing opinions.</p>
<p>"And a lot of my friends say that they want to go to a private school just so they can avoid having to relive their high school days."</p>
<p>Yeah, I have a lot of friends that did that. I actually think it's quite stupid, because come on, most state flagships have, what, 20,000+ students? If you didn't want to relive your high school days, it would be REALLY easy not to.</p>