My Love-Hate Relationship with Morning Classes

Before coming into college, I used to wake up at 5:30am to get ready for school and have class at 7am. And so my first quarter, I decided that I wanted to take one 8am to see how I liked it. That first quarter 8am was the one class I dreaded the most. It was basically an introduction to college and helping us with what different resources were available to us on campus. I thought going to that class was beyond useless to me because everything that they posted was online, but attendance was mandatory so I had to go. 

The class was all the way across campus which was the worst thing for me. So I would end up getting up about forty minutes before the class started and quickly got ready. Most of the mornings, I would end up just wearing sweats because it was cold in the morning and I didn’t feel like dressing up cute for class. It was mostly a win-win because I was comfortable throughout the day. After this class, I pretty much vowed that I wouldn’t take morning classes again. But I guess school or life had other plans for me.

As I was registering for classes for the winter quarter, my first goal was to not have any morning classes, but to my luck, every single class that was available to me or fit my schedule was a morning class. Each day of the week my classes either started at 8am or 9:30am I was kind of disappointed that I would have to be waking up early, but I really liked the classes I was going to take so I didn’t mind it as much.

As the quarter began, I was not too worried about not going to class because I was sleeping quite early so that I could get eight hours of sleep every night and yet still managed to spend some time with my friends. Even after class, I didn’t necessarily need a nap and would just do homework most of the time.

Once it was about week 5 or 6 was when I felt like I needed much more sleep. One day I was supposed to wake up at 7:30am to get ready for my 8am and I just couldn’t do it. I could barely open my eyes, that I just went straight back to bed. I was beyond exhausted that day and had just felt so drained. I didn’t miss that many classes during the quarter, but it just made me realize that 8ams were definitely not for me.

Although waking up was very difficult, there were benefits to it. After class, I was able to grab a yummy breakfast at the dining hall and accompany it with orange juice (and I really love orange juice). It also helped me be more productive. During the Fall quarter, my first class was at 3pm. So most of the time, I would end up waking up at noon and I felt like I was unproductive and didn’t do anything all day.

With morning classes, I feel like I do much more after class either by going to the gym, eating or just doing my homework. I’ve been on track with my work and haven’t felt too stressed about not doing it. So in a way morning classes aren’t too bad, but 8ams are definitely not it for me.

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• morning classes