Freshmen year at college is typically the craziest, most difficult, all the while most exciting time of your life. Whether you’re moving across the country or attending a school 15 minutes down the road, it’s still a big adjustment no matter the location or the size. A college of 2,000 can still be as overwhelming as a university of 20,000. Maybe before you left home you felt like you had everything under control and you were going to slip effortlessly into college life. Maybe you got teary eyed when your parents said goodbye and left you in your new dorm room. I know I fell somewhere in the middle. Even if you felt totally confident in your transition from high school student to collegiette, there is still no way you can avoid those embarrassing freshmen moments that mark you as a newbie to any upperclassmen within a 30 foot radius.
1. Wearing A Lanyard: You toted your new school I.D. in your wallet around all summer and couldn’t wait to try it out in the fall. Maybe your mom bought you that Vera Bradley lanyard with the matching I.D. case that you had your eye on since you got your acceptance letter. The first day of classes you excitedly attached your I.D. to your lanyard, proudly exited your dorm and felt like a college student. Classic Freshmen Mistake number 1. Keep your I.D. where it belongs: in your bag and out of sight.
2. Carrying A Map: This is quite possibly the hardest freshmen slip-up to avoid, especially with a campus as large as UConn. To find all your classes your first week, consulting a map may be necessary. But, do beware, it’s the biggest signifier of your freshmen status. When the second week of school arrives ditch the map or use the easy building locator on go.uconn.edu. If you’re lucky enough to have a smart phone, you may also download the iHusky app.
3. Crossing The Road: Unlike some colleges, UConn has quite a few busy (as in you have five seconds to cross until a car honks at you) streets. Now, if you’re from a small town, like me, crossing a busy road is a foreign concept to you. Adjusting to full-time pedestrian mode can be hazardous, but remember running across the road at full speed isn’t exactly what college students do. Instead, opt to walk at normal pace and give a nod in the direction of the car that oh-so-nicely stop for you at the crosswalk. How thoughtful of them!
4. Laundry: For many people entering college, this will be their first independent load of laundry. Now, you can’t easily call down to mom and ask if it’s okay to dry darks with whites. Visiting the laundry room was something I tried to desperately put-off until I was down to about four shirts and a pair of shorts. Little did I realize that trying to do three loads of laundry at once wasn’t my brightest idea. Not only were all the washing machines full but many students failed to keep the dryer door open after they remove their load. When my clothes were washed, I stalked those dryers while upperclassmen casually set timers on their cellphones and then sauntered back to pick up their clothes like they had done it a hundred times before. Well they probably had.
5. Getting Sloppily Smashed: It’s your first college party and you’re so curious about what a “college party” actually entails. Even though this is a moment you’ll probably want to remember forever, it’s not cool to get so drunk you forget it forever. Keep your alcohol intake at a minimum so you don’t end up tossing your cookies on the carpet because the line was too long for the bathroom. Wonder why freshmen usually get the oldest dorms? It’s because of all that stereotypical drunk underclassmen vomit. This is a freshmen moment you can totally avoid, the stigma of a sloppy drunk will certainly follow you even after your freshmen year.