Kay DeFroscia
“My first year was pretty lonely at first. I was so used to my strong network of friends in high school, and it was difficult to going to a place where I didn’t have that. I started making more and more close friends in the second semester, and the feelings of isolation have mostly gone away. The biggest things that helped me adjust were clubs, my counselor, and my teachers, all of which made me feel like I belonged here, and gave me a place to go when I needed it. I tried to use the campus events as a way of making friends a couple times, but it didn’t really work out–those events are really better for spending time with friends you already have than they are for making new ones.”
Elle Harris
“I found my first year to be unexpectedly challenging. I didn’t feel challenged throughout grade school, but I was blindsided by the sheer volume of work given in a ‘normal’ college course load, and the effort and time I needed to spend. Frankly I was getting burnt out, and I had to learn to live with that. The other challenge I had was time management. I was used to high school where I had a neat separation between time doing work (at school) and time to myself. At UNE, I was constantly alternating between classes and free time, but I had to spend effort deciding when to use my free time for work and when to goof off… Having good friends right off the bat and being able to see cool animals everywhere are probably the things that helped me the most.”
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Photos taken by Bennett Deshishku
