My last semester was crap

Transfer Students
1

<p>So, yeah. I'm going to LSU right now, and I kinda hate the semester that just passed. I didn't get to live in campus, so I'm living on an off-campus apartment. Because of that fact, I'm not able to meet people as easily, and on top of that, I don't really get along with my roommates that much.</p>

<p>Also, I had a really hard semester--not with classes, but just my social life. I didn't make a single friend, and I was stupid enough to let my boyfriend move in with me for a little. Because of that, my grades suffered a lot bit. Now that a new semester is getting ready to begin, I'm ready to bring my grades up, but I'm seriously wondering if staying much longer is really worth.</p>

<p>I don't want to chicken out of my first year in college. If I left, I'd feel like I left for all the wrong reasons (i.e. social reasons). But at the same time, I'm just not happy at all. I have no friends, and I'm living in an area that I'm extremely unfamiliar with.</p>

<p>So far, these are my options:</p>

<p>1) stay for another year and try to move in on-campus, see if i can make more friends this way
*******if this plans works out, i'd probably stay in baton rouge</p>

<p>2) use the spring semester to bring up my grades, and then try and apply to colleges closer to houston (my home town) after the semester is over</p>

<p>I just really need some advice right now. I feel like I'm stuck in a rut, and I feel so disappointed with my first semester of college. I honestly imagined this to be a fun and fulfilling time in my life, and I'm so upset with how things are turning out.</p>

2

<p>It is a common misperception that one makes friends in college via dorm living. Yes, freshman often end up bonding with some dorm mates, but just as many will grow apart in the next year as they mature and find new interests and new ways to relate and make friends (no longer so insecure as to be “stuck” with the random friend made by virtue of being stuffed in the same dorm together).</p>

<p>The best way to make friends is to take classes or join clubs that are highly interactive - be on a stage crew, join the choir or newspaper staff, get involved with an activist group or environmental club.</p>

<p>Realize that after about 4 years EVERYONE in the world gets stuck having to make new friends without sharing a cruddy dorm room together… this is a skill that needs to be learned and that dorm living does not teach.</p>

<p>Transfering back to Houston is fine–but other than the friends you already have in Houston you have the <em>same</em> problem–learning how to make friends without the crutch of a dorm.</p>

<p>Focus on your education–friends are nice to have, but unless you intend to live in the LMU area after graduation, realize everyone ELSE is probably moving anyhow and at the end of the four year run at LMU you will once again have to make new friends…without a dorm room. See the problem?</p>