I spent most of my senior year burdened by the weight of making the “right” college choice — as if there was one gilded school that could guarantee four blissful years of happiness. Sure, I knew there would be moments that sucked, when the daily grind might leave me stressed and disgruntled, but I figured these would play only a minor role in the “best years of my life.” I blame Asher Roth and “Animal House” for the unrealistic expectations.
Ultimately, I made my decision to come to the University of Virginia and was unbelievably grateful to enroll. With added familial pressure to attend another school, I felt an even higher degree of responsibility to own my choice and love it. Despite all this, I arrived on Grounds unprepared to feel so out of place so quickly.
Lost amid a horde of people frolicking in the revelry of Block Party, I slid through frat-floor slime and wondered for the first time if my new leather shoes and I had made the right choice. I just wanted someone to tell me they were overwhelmed too — overwhelmed with massive Econ lectures, confusing Rugby Road politics and pressures to wear involvements as badges of honor. I masked my discomfort by chiming in with the voice of the crowd and shouting hearty rounds of “Wahoo-wa,” but my cheers ended with a question mark, not an exclamation point.
Before I paint my first-year as one of sheer frustration, I need to say I found a lot to love at school. I learned from some of the most accomplished professors in the world, made amazing friends and was lucky enough to be in organizations with missions I felt mattered. These organizations were filled with older students who welcomed me, gave me advice on how to maximize my college experience and finished their sentences with wistful declarations of how lucky I was to have seven more semesters. I felt like I was surrounded by a majority of people who were so out-of-their-minds in love with Grounds that I just couldn’t connect.
I spent most of my time complaining internally about things that weren’t handed readily to me — a horrific waste of energy, in retrospect. There wasn’t a Communications or Journalism major and the arts department wasn’t at the caliber of schools I’d considered in L.A. or New York.
I can say now I was wrong — wrong to think I was alone in feeling overwhelmed; wrong to dwell in uncertainty when I was surrounded by the most caring network of administrators, students and advisors I will likely ever find; wrong to complain instead of pursuing constructive changes. Nonetheless, my feelings of disconnect were real.
By December, I had applied to transfer to the school my parents had urged me to attend in the first place. It was “just in case,” I told myself — just in case things didn’t get better second semester. I felt like I had to try it at the other school to make my parents happy and I felt like I owed it to myself to find a place that would make me out-of-my-mind in love too. By the end of second semester, I wasn’t sure I wanted to stay, but I wasn’t sure I wanted to leave either. I ended up crafting the Great Compromise: a study abroad program that required transferring to the other school to attend. So I did.
It’s been three months and I have learned some important things about the University during my time with another school. I discovered, through the logistical nightmare of resubmitting the Common Application, just how deeply University faculty care about their students. My deans understood my situation and were more than willing to work with me to pursue the course of action I deemed best for myself. I was not a number at U.Va., as I am at the school I transferred to. The University cared about me enough to encourage me to leave and made it incredibly easy for me to return.
Second, by comparing the autonomy granted to University students with my stifling experience at this new school, I have been able to see clearly just how open avenues of academic inquiry and extracurricular entrepreneurship are on Grounds. Yes, red-tape exists, as it does at every university. But I’m unsure why we are so quick to consider student self-governance a farce simply because it is wrapped in a requisite amount of bureaucratic oversight to allow the University to function legally as an institution. We are fortunate to go to a school where administrators work to ensure there is less red-tape here than at most schools across the country.
Finally, I’ve come to the conclusion there is no place I would rather be than the University. Here we are encouraged to ask questions, start initiatives and be the change we wish to see in the school that we govern ourselves. By spending my first year thinking I needed permission to be critical, I made a mockery of the very autonomy I claimed through student self-governance.
Like me, you don’t have to love the University unequivocally. In fact, I really hope you think actively about the things you don’t love about this school; the only way change will happen is if we allow ourselves to be constructively frustrated by the things we don’t love and channel our qualms into productive action.
I’ve come to understand that the gilded school I envisioned my senior year doesn’t exist — there are only gilded experiences to be made within imperfect constructs. I am coming back to Grounds next month fully prepared to ask questions, seek change and proudly proclaim “Wahoo-wa!” — sans question mark.
Lauren’s column runs biweekly Fridays. She can be reached at l.jackson@cavalierdaily.com.
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