<p>My daughter just started college this year and is having a tough time. She i quiet, but she has joined clubs and a sorority to get to know people. It is a public university with 20,000 students in Illinois. A lot of the kids came to college with their high school friends. She has tried to get to know people in her clubs etc.. They are always busy with the friends they came to college with. She went to visit her friend at a smaller college with 2,500 who is also quiet and has made lots of friends her freshman year.</p>
<p>She is very depressed and is wondering if she is better going to a smaller school. She is in her second semester of freshman year. It has a good business program, but I don't know if she should stay. Does anyone have any good suggestions for this situation. Thanks for any help you can give me. She is willing to try another semester but she was crying when she had to go back after spring break. Please help</p>
<p>Will she be living in the sorority house next year? That can make a huge difference when it comes to making friends. In the meantime, if she is feeling lonely, she could make a real effort to go to her sorority house regularly. Hanging out at the house will help her get more involved, and it is a great way to get to know people outside of her pledge class. She has a better chance to be around when people make plans to hang out or go out. </p>
<p>It can take a little more effort on her part, but at least she has set the groundwork for making connections. It is not always easy to make close friends, especially in a campus with existing friendships.</p>
She is at a school with 20,000 students. The idea that everyone brought their friends with them and isn’t open to making any new ones is just silly. It is rather normal for some quiet people to be depressed in a new setting like this. But a depressed person has an even harder time making friends. There are probably counselors in the health office, if she feels like she needs to talk to someone, perhaps get some temp medication. </p>
<p>As far as getting involved, is she religious minded at all? Most campuses have an office of campus ministry, often active in volunteer work in the community or planning trips to other communities. You say she has tried to get to know people - how has she gone about doing that?</p>
<p>Wow. That’s just hard for you and for her. I’m sorry.</p>
<p>I know the directional universities in Illinois can be like that, just like going from Jr. High to High School, and then on to the university with the same group of friends. I’m really sorry your daughter is so unhappy. I think that’s tough to see as a parent.</p>
<p>If there is money and other alternatives? Or if there is a school near home? Maybe those might be better options? I do not know what your circumstances are, but I think a year is long enough to “give a school a chance,” personally. I think college is a good time to find out you really can change your mind in life. It’s all right to say you don’t like something and to do something else.</p>
<p>Are you open to exploring options with her? How do you feel about it?</p>
<p>I disagree. At some state universities, particularly those that draw primarily from one region within the state, almost everyone arrives with established groups of friends from high school. Socially, these students are more like upperclassmen than freshmen. They already have a social group, and while they wouldn’t completely object to making new friends, they aren’t particularly seeking them. </p>
<p>In some ways, a newcomer to a community like this is more like a transfer student than a freshman, and it can be hard to find friends in that situation.</p>
<p>I agree with poetgrl. If there is money available and other alternative, getting some applications out to smaller schools will give her a choice if, by the end of second semester, she still hasn’t found ‘her people.’ It’s not a failure on her part to decide that some place isn’t a good fit, so long as you and she feel she has given it a reasonable try.</p>
<p>My D is also quiet/shy. She chose to attend a very small, local school and live on campus. She’d grown up with the campus and always found the students there to be very friendly. </p>
<p>She joined things. She attended campus activities. As recently as a month ago, she still felt like there was no one she could really talk to. Her first roommate was a party animal. Mid-way through first semester, she moved in with the one close friend she had at school. That girl withdrew from school during second semester. And then D was really alone. Best thing that ever happened to her. One night, she was feeling very lonely, and she called out to some kids in the hallway that she kind of knew. She had to start forcing herself out and knocking on doors. SHe had to start asking to join people in the cafeteria. </p>
<p>I guess what I’m trying to say is that a small school is not necessarily the answer. Until D got put into a postion where she was forced to go out and find people, she just didn’t do it. Clubs and organized activities are good places to meet people, but one has to be willing to follow up, and I’m not sure D was doing that until recently. </p>
<p>If your D is truly miserable and her misery is either affecting her work or has clouded her view of her school to the point where she cannot be happy, look into transferring. If she decides to stay put, remind her that in the fall, a whole new group of students will arrive, giving her another, fresh opportunity to connect with people.</p>
<p>Transferring to a small school isn’t always as easy as it sounds- coming in as a sophomore, there will be friendships already formed there, too. The thing about joining (adding to what ordinarylives wrote,) is that you have to show up regularly, let people see that you are part of the group, not just an occasional extra face. Whatever it is, show up repeatedly. And agree with sylvan- the relig groups are usually welcoming, as are volunteer projects where you work side by side with fellow students. Making your way in college is so different than hs, where everyone eventually lands at home around dinner time. It’s a life lesson to find a way to fit. Good luck. It’s a challenging time.</p>
<p>Can she volunteer to help transfer students next year? Training for that group may start soon, and that would be a way to meet “unaffiliated” people. Can she become a RA? The RAs frequently form their own support groups?</p>
<p>You need to get to the bottom of her sadness.
Did she have an unfortunate encounter with a stranger/guy at a party?
How were her grades?
Maybe her sorority isn’t a good fit for her.
She may be depressed and needs to go to the student counseling for help.</p>
<p>Dee556 - My daughter has an almost identical story. She’s not super outgoing, joined a sorority for social aspects, etc. and wound up hiding in her apartment almost the entire first term. She didn’t feel like she fit in and I was concerned that she would need to come home and attend a local college. She had a few friends she met over her summer semester and that was it - and those kids mostly didn’t go out or really socialize other than when they came across each other in a class or on campus. Fast forward a few months and she changed her major and basically it changed her completely. She went back to college in January with a new outlook on her academic plan and it had a huge impact on her socially as well. Turns out she was just feeling unsure of her major and life direction and was surrounded by sorority sisters that had their plans cemented and knew what they wanted out of life. Now she is much more social (still hides in her apartment occasionally because she likes her peace and quiet). </p>
<p>That said, when we went through orientation, the student services director did say that if your student is still depressed and withdrawn after Christmas break then you may have a problem on your hands and going away to college may not be the right thing for that particular student. Just food for thought.</p>
Still silly. Even if Student A arrives with 100 friends from the same HS, there are still ~4900 other freshmen he/she doesn’t really know, and plenty of his friends who went off to school elsewhere. Do people get their little set of friends by 18 and never make any new ones after that? The 100 friends are not going to all be in the same dorms, or the same classes, or the same clubs. Otherwise the clubs would be called “Students from HS X”, “Friends of Bill”, etc. </p>
<p>I came into a large university as a Junior. Sure people had friends, but I fell in with some others in my department and didn’t lack for company. By the following year I was one of the department society leaders and was editing the department’s student newsletter. S is at a smaller school where a number of his friends are also, but that hasn’t thwarted him from gathering up some new ones as well - people on his floor, in his classes, in the honors program, in the chorus, etc.</p>
<p>OP: sounds like stories we’ve heard from parents of UIUC students, particular for Chicago suburban kids from large high schools sending a large group of new students each year downstate, those kids often rooming together in dorms and then off-campus apartments, ease of facebook/texting w/HS classmates, and schedules filled w/large lecture-hall classes create a campus environment not conducive to easy formation of new friendships (vs class/dorm/cafeteria acquaintances).</p>
<p>It is very common at the non-flagships schools in Indiana for 20-30 kids from our high school to request the same dorms, rush the same houses and basically continue to live in the high school bubble. I can see where that would be very difficult, and that is why livin in the house should be an improvement. It can be hard to break in but being there every day will help to get to know everyone.</p>
<p>Thanks. The Sorority doesn’t have a house. She has been going to their events and trying to get to know some of the girls. Hopefully it will help.</p>
<p>She has joined activities on the campus where they plan Friday nights and concerts. She has also joined a sorority. She was screened for depression and does not have it. I will ask her if they have religious groups on campus she would be interested in.</p>
<p>We have told her if she is unhappy she could take a year off. I know she would like to go to a smaller university like 5,000 or less. We are not sure we could afford a private university. We have also told her she could go to our local community college for a year and then decide. I know she is disappointed because she loved this college when she came to visit it. Thank you for your understanding.</p>
<p>She should at least investigate her options. I know I didn’t like going to my small LAC in that first year and it took another 3 semesters to transfer. Back then, my mom didn’t get involved. Having this “project” might help her to formulate why she’s unhappy and figure out where she’d might fit in better.</p>
<p>If $$$ is an issue, going to a community college could be part of the plan, finished up at a smaller college of her choice. While she’s researching, she should also be sure to explore various scholarships that could make it more affordable.</p>
<p>Dee, my son is having a similarly difficult time as is my friend’s daughter. He is toughing it out, but, oh, it hurts me so that he is having such a tough socially. I had warned him as he was going from a tightly knitted private setting to a large OOS public. So he went into this eyes wide open. My friend’s D has filed transfer papers. My son has pretty much accepted this as part of the way things go. He could not get any roommates for next year and was assigned a single room in the dorms which means living primarily with freshmen, making him unhappy about that prospect.</p>
<p>See if you can’t go spend the weekend with her, maybe give her a break and really have a heart-to-heart. First year ennui is quite common, but so are underlying issues or just a mismatch. Two of my nieces experienced the same thing. Both accepted to their ED colleges. One just need to spend the weekend or two with us (we live closer than her parents) venting and getting lots of support. She absolutely thrived after that. The other niece really was in a mismatch, she took the initiative and applied out after the first year and is thrilled in her much bigger home-state school. I myself transferred out after 18 months at a state-school and spent the rest of my college years at a great school where I met my husband and most of my friends. Listen hard to your kid(s) and be prepared to make a move (after all 30% of students end up transferring).</p>