<p>Yowch, T2, were you ever a teenager? Going to college can be scary; I’d never been away from home for more than 3 weeks on end before. It’s especially frightening if you were a little awkward in high school which, TV tells me, is a bit of a common problem. High school for me, possibly like the OP, didn’t involve a whole heck of a lot of normal socializing, which I would have hoped would inspire compassion or pity, not such contempt. Jeez.</p>
<p>OP: This thread is largely directed at academic doubts, but you should have a look at it for general zen: <a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/harvard-university/1260889-harvard-class-questions.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/harvard-university/1260889-harvard-class-questions.html</a></p>
<ol>
<li>Everybody sits with everybody in Annenberg for the first month ish.</li>
<li>Find the Facebook group.
2b. Do not remotely believe that the Facebook group’s posts are representative of your class as a whole. From looking at 2014’s posts, I was like “gee, this is 50% IOP wonks and 50% musical theater singy people. I am neither of these things.” While there are a lot of governmentals, sure, there are not that many. The MT kids over-represented by like 1000. It was pretty random.</li>
<li>They do a pretty great job with roommates, generally; if they don’t, you’ll meet your hallmates and that will be good.
3b. That said, they might not be the roommates you picked for yourself, so give it time: mine were all in the prep / New York crowd, while I am neither of those things. First couple weeks were awk, but it worked. We aren’t the closest now, but we’re still pretty close and I’m quite happy with the room I got. (My hasty pudding club friend is among my favorite people on campus, although I royally do not fit in with most of her friends. They’re perfectly polite to me in groups, though.)</li>
<li>If you’re planning on taking freshman classes (ec 10, e.g., or fall expos), or you just find other freshmen in a section, you can make friends through that.</li>
<li>Extracurriculars. Join them. Think about joining more than you do join.</li>
<li>If you can still register for a pre-orientation program, do! Usually you don’t stay lasting friends, but it makes heading to Annenberg less scary.</li>
</ol>