<p>True. But especially if the school is fairly large (several thousand), she will be able to make her own space and her own group of friends. And “potluck” in the dorms is usually not bad. Most colleges seem to make quite a concerted effort to match roommates well according to quite a few criteria. Certainly better than when I went through the process! :)</p>
<p>My kid left Texas to re-invent herself. (Why? I have no idea. Big money is on “escaping nut-dad”.) Wouldn’t even look at a school (except Tech and a special program there) where any of her classmates attended. Not hard since all but a handful were at A+M or Baylor and one or two each at other Texas schools and she wanted OOS for UG. I’d say Arkansas has done real well for kids I know IRL or online (as has Ole Miss, South Carolina, Oklahoma, Auburn, Clemson, Kansas, UGA, Mizzou) and Arkansas has plenty of Walton $ for kids with good grades and scores. Two close family friends are at Arkansas now and speak VERY highly of the education, atmosphere, and affordability. </p>
<p>Friends who went to school together? Some good experiences, some not so good. No pattern I can discern.</p>
<p>Some are even in San Marcos. ;)</p>
<p>I know it probably depends on the kids and the “DRAMA” factor involved…let’s face it, girls are dramatic LOL…anyway, keep the feedback coming!! It’s helping me :)</p>
<p>I agree with prior posters – it won’t be an issue unless D chooses to room with a HS mate. This shouldn’t be a problem even at a medium-sized school. There are 8,000 at D’s OOS private, including two others from D’s HS. One she never sees (thankfully), and the other she catches a glimpse of once a semester while walking between classes.</p>
<p>As a college student, I agree with others that it should be fine, as long as she makes it clear to her friends that while she loves them and will want to see them sometimes, she doesn’t want to live with them or spend all her time with them.</p>
<p>Another reassuring story: I go to a school of less than 3,000 students. Currently there are two other kids from my HS here. One of them I literally only see about four times a semester, and we do no more than say hi. Another one, who I was closer to in high school and runs in a slightly overlapping circle, I’ve run into maybe three times so far this semester, and each time we hug, chat for about ten minutes, and thats it.</p>
<p>My kids haven’t gone to college yet, but I’ll give you my experience. I went to a small high school (50 in the graduating class). 14 of us went to the same college. We hung out with our high school friends, but also made lots of new friends. Eventually most gravitated more toward the new friends, but remained friendly with the high school classmates. It was not possible to “reinvent” yourself with so many people that knew you already there, but it was very easy to make new friends and frankly, for kids who aren’t terribly outgoing, it’s easier to go to parties and other events where you can meet new people with someone you already know.</p>
<p>Here in Ohio, there are multiple members of my daughter’s H.S. class at CWRU, OSU, OU and Miami. The CWRU, OSU, and OU kids don’t really see each other (except for two CWRU kids who are both music majors - they cross paths). I think that a number of the Miami kids party together at school (with dozens of other people from other schools, of course), so it would be very hard for any of them to “reinvent themselves” at college. Hmmm. This is a tough one. If she can picture something like this happening at one of the schools she is looking at, it makes sense to try to prevent it. I think that if at all possible, she should try to avoid going to a school where multiple members of her H.S. “crowd” are going.</p>
<p>“Potluck” is just that: who knows who you’ll get. Sometimes a good fit, sometimes not, but no guarantee that rooming with a friend or acquaintance is going to be a good fit, either. First semester of my freshman year I roomed with someone I didn’t know and it was okay, but I changed to live with my best friend (met in college) for second semester. That turned out to be terrible as we grew apart and ended up not liking each other very much!</p>
<p>I agree with others that it’s quite likely in a large school that she will not run into the hs people very often.</p>
<p>I went to college with my best friend. We lived next door to one another, and remained best friends through college. It wasn’t really a problem at all – more the opposite. We both wanted to meet other people, and did. Our close, comfortable relationship, and the fact that neither of us could really pretend to be someone he wasn’t because the other would call him on it, made us very attractive to other people, many of whom felt deracinated, and mistrustful of all the reinvention that was going on around us. (Two former best friends of mine from grade school were also at the same college. I didn’t see them often – a couple of times a year, other than just waving hello across a street.)</p>
<p>Three of my son’s friends roomed together (with a fourth, randomly placed guy) at Penn for two years. That didn’t sound like such a hot idea to me, but I think it has worked out OK. Reportedly, they have drifted apart to a considerable extent, and no longer lean on each other as they did for a while.</p>
<p>Meanwhile, six kids (out of 24) from my daughter’s 4th grade (!) classroom wound up at the same college, 700 or so miles from their homes. Some of them she rarely saw, but she wound up sharing an apartment with one for two years, and socializes with another fairly frequently. One of her best college friends lived three blocks from us for 10 years, but they never really did more than meet one another until college.</p>
<p>At their high school, 100+ kids from every class wind up at Temple. Lots of them do essentially continue their high school world into college. (And, reputedly, form cabals to try to dominate student organizations – they are certainly the largest block of students from anywhere at that college.)</p>