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  • The Complete Guide to Your Freshman Year of College

    A young woman holds open a large map with the text overlay The Complete Guide to Your Freshman Year of College by The Peaceful Professor

    Transitioning from the structure and predictability of high school to the stressful, unfamiliar world of college can cause panic in both young adults and their parents. But have no fear! Sara Pennington from Segue to College has the ultimate guide to see you through this challenging time. I had the opportunity to interview Sara about her new book, The Complete Guide to Your Freshman Year of College, in which she reveals the very best tips and tricks for smoothly transitioning into college life.

    Photo of Sara Pennington, dressed in all black, smiling at the camera.
    Sara Pennington. Photo by Kelsie Johanna Photography

    Imposter Syndrome and Loneliness

    Jessica: What are some of the challenges that students frequently encounter as a college freshman?

    Sara: I think one of the big things, initially, is feeling like you don’t belong at college. You kind of feel like a visitor. I very distinctly have a memory of walking from the dining area back to my dorm by myself and thinking, “I don’t feel like I should be here. I feel like it was a mistake I got in.” And I think that’s pretty normal. But I don’t think we talk about that a lot and I think we should talk about it.

    This relates to student imposter syndrome, which is the idea of having a complete lack of self confidence about your abilities, doubting why you’re there, and feeling like you should just give up because you don’t belong.

    I think this is a big deal because within that first month or so, you make habits as a freshman that can completely change your college career. You make choices about how you spend your time and what things are going to be important to you. Combating that imposter syndrome mindset with, “it’s okay to feel this way” is important. It’s okay to feel like I don’t belong because you know what? I’m in a different stage of my adult life, and it’s going to be awkward and uncomfortable, but it’s okay to feel this way.

    Along with imposter syndrome is loneliness. I don’t think that most high schoolers realize how lonely they’re going to feel as a college freshman. Sometimes students have this idea that college will be the best time of their lives and they’re going to make friends for the rest of their life and it’s going to be incredible. And it is going to be an incredible experience. However, I think putting the pressure on students to think that this is going to be the best time of their life leads to imposter syndrome and loneliness because they get there and think, “this is it? There’s nothing to do, I don’t know anyone, and I don’t have any money.” So they feel disappointed, like they have failed somehow. Those are two things that I think students experience that they maybe didn’t expect to feel.

    Jessica: I think that’s a really excellent point. How often in pop culture and from family and friends do young people hear “these are going to be the best four years of your life”? I think we set students up for that expectation, and it sets the bar really high.

    And there’s always that social comparison as well. They may look around their campus or see their friends at other schools on Facebook and think, “everybody else has it together and they’re having the time of their lives. And I’m in my dorm room missing my family and feeling like I don’t belong here.” And that can lead to a lot of mental health issues down the road. We need to warn students more about those less than ideal, uncomfortable feelings that they’re going to have, which they may not have experienced in high school or ever before, maybe.

    Homesickness

    Jessica: What advice would you give a college freshman who’s feeling particularly homesick or lonely or like they don’t fit in? Are there things that they can do to alleviate some of those feelings?

    Sara: Yes! And this depends on how close they live to home. Some students go far away, maybe even on purpose, from where they live. While other students are within a few hours or less. So, that can change what their choices are. I’ll first address students who live close enough for a day trip to go home. I know that some people are going to disagree with me, but going home often makes your homesickness much worse because you’re home a lot and you’re at school lot and you’re not fitting in in either place. And that is a worse feeling than just being homesick. So if you live close to home, I would encourage you to go home once a month at the most. This will help you transition and help you finally feel like somewhere is home.

    For students who live far away, the big thing is calling home. If you call home a lot and you’re homesick, be really careful that you are allowing yourself to develop the adult skills that you really should develop in college. If you call home for advice for little things, you can actually hurt your college experience. It’s easier to call home when you can’t remember “how do I wash this?” or “what do I do about this?” or “how do I talk to my roommate?” It’s easier to call home about those things. But sometimes, struggling and failing is a very good process to go through if you’re going to develop the skills that you’ll need as an adult after college.

    So I think those are the two big areas: visiting home and calling home. If you’re homesick, you may be hurting yourself and making your problem worse by calling home too frequently or going home too frequently.

    Jessica: That’s good advice because, logically, a lot of people would say, “if you’re homesick, call home.” But I think you’re absolutely right that done with too much frequency, it doesn’t allow you to push yourself outside your comfort zone and stick around on the weekends when maybe your college is having events for freshmen or events for the whole campus that you could participate in and make some connections. If you’re going home, you’re going to miss out on all that stuff.

    Four students, two men and two women, walk together across their college campus.

    The First Weekend on Campus

    Jessica: Along those lines, what mistakes do you see college freshmen making when they start their first year?

    Sara: I have older siblings and they were really great sharing advice with me when I went to college. One of the best pieces of advice I ever received was from my brother. He said a lot of people during the first weekend they’re in college spend that time hanging out with friends or going to parties or events. They end up getting behind because when Sunday night comes, they’re scrambling to get work done for Monday morning. So I would say one of the biggest mistakes that students make when they first get to college is not staying on top of stuff from the beginning.

    If you start the semester by turning in the very first assignment late, or maybe it’s incomplete or done very poorly, you are setting yourself up to have a rough semester. Not to say that you couldn’t improve and you couldn’t get back on top of things because you probably could, but it takes a lot of work. You’re setting patterns for yourself that you are going to imitate the rest of the semester. So if you spend most of the time your first weekend socializing and very little time doing any school work, you’re setting yourself up to be behind. It can’t hurt to be ahead at the beginning of the school year, because it leaves you some wiggle room if something happens such as getting sick or a family emergency.

    Choosing a Major

    Jessica: With regard to choosing a major, many students and their parents put a lot of pressure on making this decision freshman year. What are your thoughts about the importance of picking a major and making sure it’s the “perfect” major for you?

    Sara: It is important and it isn’t important. It’s kind of a double-edged sword. It is important in the sense that college is very expensive. When you think about how much college costs, that’s the price of a very expensive car or a small house, depending on where you go. If you think of it in those terms, it’s a big investment. So when you go to college, you want to be careful that you are not wasting your time. We’ve all met the “perpetual college major changer,” if that can be a title. It seems like every semester they change their major, and that’s not where you want to be. So in that regard, deciding on a major is important.

    However, I do think that sometimes there’s way too much pressure on picking the right major. I firmly believe that students usually do not know what they love before they go to college because the way you figure out you enjoy something is that you are actually doing it, you’ve experienced it. And most of the time before you go to college, the most you’ll do is shadow someone or maybe go to a booth on career day at your high school. So you don’t really know what you love because your experiences have been so limited.

    I think that we as parents or as teachers, even as students, we need to be careful that we’re not putting this pressure to “pursue what you love” or “do what you love.” I think that kind of advice can be really misleading because, as a high school student, you don’t know yet what you love. You’re just doing stuff, and it’s by doing stuff that you had no idea would be helpful in the future, that you end up where you are today.

    I think of myself — I was a music major, so the idea that I would become a Communication instructor is kind of laughable to me. I didn’t imagine myself where I am, but several experiences along the way developed these skills and this experience that made me realize I enjoy helping people to learn. So be very careful that you are not choosing a major based on what you love right now, because that can change and it probably will change.

    Jessica: That’s great advice. I think this pressure is a hold-over from decades ago when there were only so many majors in higher education, and that major was tied to what your future career would be. There are still cases like that, like engineering or education. But the jobs, the careers, that these kids are going to have in the future, some of them don’t even exist yet. One of the beauties of liberal arts education in particular is that it encourages students to experiment and to take courses that they never had in high school. I think we put a lot of pressure on 17 and 18 year olds to figure out what they’re going to do when they’re 25 or 30.

    Sara: Right. And it can really cause a lot of decision paralysis because they think, “my major determines the rest of my life and I’m 18. How am I supposed to make that kind of a choice now?” Well, the reality is, they can’t make that choice now.

    Parents: Letting Go and Setting Expectations

    Jessica: Your book is written to students, so you’re talking to the incoming college freshman, but do you have any advice for parents? What they can do to help their student during this challenging transition from high school to college?

    Sara: I think one of the biggest questions that parents should ask themselves is, “what am I not willing to do to help my freshman succeed?” When there are issues between the parent and child, very few times are parents under-involved. It’s mostly the other way around, in my experience. It can be very hard for parents to let go and understandably so. I’m not a parent, but I can imagine that it is very difficult to let go when you know that your child is making mistakes that will have some painful consequences.

    As a parent, you love your child and you want your child to succeed. However, parents have to be willing to step back, even when it’s painful to watch, and allow their child to go through these growing pains. Because there will be some. They will be hard to watch. They will be hard to listen to. And you might feel heartless. You might feel insensitive or like you’re failing as a parent, but a lot of the college experience is learning by making mistakes.

    So as a parent, consider what you’re not willing to do to help your child succeed, whether that means not calling as much or not being in contact as much. Whether that means taking the responsibility for their grades and passing it on to them. Hopefully, that’s happened some in high school, but that is a big one. I think sometimes parents have this idea that because their child got a 4.0 in high school that they’ll be able to do that in college. And while sometimes that is the case, it’s usually not the norm.

    College classes can be more difficult, but the biggest key is that they’re juggling multiple things. They’re not just juggling one or two things, now they have like seven, and they only have two hands, and they’ve never learned how to juggle. So they’re learning this for themselves. And by constantly asking “are you getting enough sleep?” “Are you eating?” “How are your grades?” it could make your freshman feel like you don’t have respect for them. That you don’t have respect that they can do this on their own. They might even think, “my parents don’t even believe that I can do this. Who am I to think that I can do this?” So just be really careful about those boundaries.

    And the other advice I would give is to communicate what you expect. Do you expect your child to call you once every day? Do you expect your child to come home every break? A lot of times we don’t communicate that and when your child doesn’t meet those expectations, you’re incredibly disappointed. But your child didn’t know you had those expectations. And while you might feel like they’re understood expectations, you have to be careful that you communicate that because sometimes your freshman can miss those things.

    Jessica: I’m not a parent either, so while we may not have that understanding, we’ve seen these issues as instructors. It really adds another layer of stress to the student who’s already stressed out about 12 different things. If they’re also having to worry about what mom or dad is thinking about them, or worrying about them, that adds extra stress and pressure to the student.

    And I think it’s really interesting what you said about students thinking, “if mom and dad are constantly checking on me and swooping in to solve problems for me while I’m at school, maybe they don’t believe that I can do it.” That could become a self-fulfilling prophecy. Parents want to protect their kids and they want their kids to be safe and successful and happy. But I don’t think a lot of them consider, “am I communicating that I don’t believe in my child’s capabilities?” That’s really powerful.

    A stressed male student sitting at a table in the library, pinching the bridge of his nose and holding a stack of papers.

    Stress and Overwhelm

    Jessica: What advice would you give to a college freshman who is feeling really stressed and overwhelmed their first semester?

    Sara: First of all, I would say it’s normal to feel stressed and there’s nothing wrong with you. I have many memories of, as a music major, sitting in a practice room and just sobbing because I felt so overwhelmed. I look back and I laugh at myself a little bit. It’s important to keep a realistic perspective. It can be very easy to get upset and emotionally invested in little mistakes. Be really careful not to build things up in your mind that aren’t a big deal.

    So, for example, maybe you went to class and you forgot there was a quiz, and you’re beating yourself up mentally — “I can’t believe I did that. What an idiot. Why am I even at college if I can’t keep track of things like this?” It’s easy to beat yourself up and to dwell on it. But that’s wasting a lot of time and energy. Instead, you should be thinking, “Okay, that was not smart. I should have known that, but mistakes happen sometimes. What can I do so that it doesn’t happen again?”

    Another thing is to make sure that you are organized. I will never forget one year in college, I walked in on my roommate crying. She was so overwhelmed because she had strewn across her bed all these syllabi and she told me, “I’ve never used a planner before.” I was, first of all, shocked because I wondered how she had gotten this far and not used a planner. And I was not surprised she was crying because I probably would be, too, if I was trying to keep track of all my assignments based on pieces of paper that aren’t combined into one notebook.

    If you aren’t organized, you are going to be stressed, that is an almost 100% guarantee. So while you may be able to remember something later without writing it down, just go ahead and write it down, whether it’s on your computer, on your phone, wherever, write it down so that you don’t have to keep track of it throughout the whole day. Because that will add stress in your day. So my advice is to keep a realistic perspective and get organized.

    Advice for Your Younger Self

    Jessica: Excellent advice. I’d like to wrap up with a slightly more personal question. If you could go back in time and talk to yourself as a college freshman, what advice would you give her?

    Sara: To not get so obsessed over little mistakes. This is something I’m still learning. I tend to be a perfectionist, and I can let little things ruin my day. So I’d tell myself to remember, “this is just one mistake and I’m not perfect and that’s good because if I was perfect, I wouldn’t be learning.”

    And then the other thing is, and this goes along with my tendency to be a perfectionist, don’t be so obsessed with getting all A’s. It can be very difficult for a student who’s used to getting A’s in high school to go to college and get a C or B or, even worse, a D. You feel incredibly demoralized. You feel like a loser and like there’s something wrong with you. But one of the biggest adjustments for students and parents is that “average” in college is a C. And for an A student, that’s a difficult thing to wrestle with. So you have to adjust your mindset.

    For some reason, my first semester at college, I was obsessed with getting a 4.0. I had no social life. I was a nerd for sure. I stressed about it so much and I wish I could go back to myself and say, “your grades need to be good, but they don’t need to be perfect, and you need to stop stressing out. It’s okay to get B’s, even an occasional C. Do your best and that’s all you can do, you can’t do any more than your best.” So those are probably the biggest things that I wish I could go back and shake my own shoulders and say “hey, listen to me!”

    Jessica: I understand that. I, too, am a perfectionist. And I think a lot of students are. Many students had an easy high school experience and they were able to get a 4.0 without a lot of effort. So when they come to college, it’s truly a shock to them how challenging some of the intellectual work is. I’m often surprised by how many students tell me, “I never had to study in high school. And now I feel like that’s all I do is study.” There’s definitely a culture shock in that transition from high school to college for a lot of students.

    So I think that’s excellent advice. Give yourself a break from time to time, try your hardest, and use the resources that are on campus to help you. Most colleges have writing centers, tutoring, professors’ office hours, and other resources which help students get the support they need to do their best.

    Did you enjoy this excerpt from my interview with Sara? Well, this post is just the tip of the iceberg! To get even more fantastic advice, check out Sara’s book The Complete Guide to Your Freshman Year of College and her blog Segue to College.

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  • 5 Ways to Support Your College Student During Final Exams

    The end of the semester can be a very challenging time for your college student. They’re already exhausted from a busy term but still have to push through projects and final exams. Although it can be difficult to offer support when your student is far from home, here are five ways you can help them manage final exam stress and finish the semester strong.

    Encourage stress management

    Many college classes have the bulk of their high-value assignments at the end of the term and final exams tend to be weighted heavily. This puts a lot of pressure on students to perform well.  Combine that pressure with ineffective stress management, and you have a recipe for burnout.

    Remind your student that studying effectively and efficiently requires them to take care of their mental and physical health. This means making a plan in advance, which includes not just what they need to study but also the breaks they will take and the self-care activities they’ll participate in to relieve stress.

    To make their plan, encourage your student to review syllabi, class notes, and the university exam schedule, then work backwards to determine how much time they’ll need to devote to each course. They should add these time slots to their planners as well as regular breaks in between. It’s also a good idea to schedule appointments with professors and tutors before finals week since that’s a busy time for everyone on campus.

    Also, encourage your student to continue doing activities they enjoy and to not isolate themselves in their dorm room or apartment.  Getting outside and among their friends are important stress relievers.

    Remind your student of campus resources

    Colleges and universities offer students a huge array of services and resources. Unfortunately, many students are unaware of everything their school offers (or, they know about them but don’t take advantage). Make sure you’re aware of the campus offices that are dedicated to student success, which will be listed on you student’s college website. These offices and centers include resources such as academic tutoring, study skill development, recreation, and mental health counseling.

    Most colleges and universities also host numerous events during final exam week to help students de-stress, which often include free food and fun activities. It’s also common for professors to offer exam review sessions, study guides, and extra office hours. And please don’t forget about the campus counseling center! They often increase their hours during exam week and offer services like peer counseling and support via text messaging.

    So when your student complains about how stressed and overwhelmed they are, encourage them to take advantage of these resources. After all, their tuition helps pay for them!

    Emphasize the importance of sleep

    Many people think all-nighters are a collegiate rite of passage. What they really are is a recipe for ill health. According to the American Academy of Sleep Medicine, studies of college students have found that lack of sleep, erratic sleep/wake schedules, and poor sleep quality have a negative impact on academic performance and overall mental health.

    More specifically, a growing body of research in neuroscience is demonstrating how important sleep is to learning and memory.  It’s during sleep that our brains organize and prioritize information learned during the day. According to Dr. Matthew Walker, a sleep researcher at the University of California, Berkeley, sleep after learning is essential to save new information into the architecture of the brain. Without sleep, our ability to learn new information can drop by up to 40 percent!  So remind your student that staying awake all night to study is actually doing them more harm than good.

    Five Ways to Support Your College Student During Final Exams The Peaceful Professor helps students and their families have a happier and healthier college experience.

    Listen more, talk less

    When your student calls, upset and overwhelmed, you may feel the urge to swoop in and fix what’s ailing them. Although being supportive is essential, you want to empower them, not enable them. During these conversations, it’s best to let your student do most of the talking. Let them vent then ask questions rather than telling them what to do. For example, ask: “what are you going to do about this situation?” Encourage them to formulate a plan with specific steps to solve their own problems.

    It’s also important to ask your student what they need from you rather than assuming you know what would help them. Perhaps they want a care package with comforting reminders of home, a sounding board for their ideas, or simply someone to listen to them. You won’t know what they need unless you ask!

    Another way to offer support is to send your student encouraging messages, such as texts or emails. This lets them know you’re thinking about them without being too intrusive. If your student doesn’t have time to talk on the phone, or doesn’t respond right away to a text, don’t get upset. Remember that they are busy and give them space.

    Be mindful of your student’s mental health

    Sometimes parents don’t realize just how much pressure students feel to perform well in school. Many students report that a lot of their stress comes from not wanting to disappoint their families. Make sure your student knows that their health and happiness are far more important to you than the grades they earn on their exams.

    For some students, the pressure of final exams can become overwhelming and contribute to the development or exacerbation of mental health conditions like depression and anxiety. Thus, it’s critical to be mindful of your student’s mental health.

    Mood swings are not unusual during exams, but if your student has exhibited any of the following signs, it’s time to get more involved and have your student make an appointment with the campus counseling center:

    • Persistent feelings of sadness, hopelessness, and worthlessness
    • Angry outbursts, irritability or frustration, even over small matters
    • Unexplained physical problems, such as back pain or headaches
    • Loss of interest in most or all day-to-day activities, including a loss of pleasure in activities they once enjoyed.
    • Unusual sleep disturbances, including insomnia or sleeping too much
    • Extreme changes in appetite
    • Slowed speaking or body movements
    • Trouble concentrating, making decisions, and remembering things
    • Frequent or recurrent thoughts of death, suicidal thoughts, and suicide attempts

    Thinking about these things can be scary, but it’s important for parents to pay close attention to their student’s behavior in order to notice these warning signs. Getting your student help early can prevent conditions from worsening.

    If you suspect that your student may be struggling with their mental health, ask them directly how they are currently feeling and encourage them to make an appointment with the campus counseling center. If you’re alarmed by changes in your student’s behavior, you can also communicate directly with the college’s counseling office or student affairs office.

    Final exam week is a very challenging time for students, both emotionally and intellectually.  Having a support network and an understanding of stress management strategies are essential to effectively managing this hectic time. Ultimately, your student’s success is up to them, but employing these five strategies will help you support your student no matter how far away they are.


    Looking for advice to share with your college student about how to perform well on their final exams while maintaining their sanity?  Send them the link to this blog post: The Top Five Mistakes College Students Make During Finals Week

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