I remember heading to orientation with my mom on June 24th, 2016. I was frightened but I was also excited. Even though I had spoken with students from my high school that had already attended orientation, I felt very scatterbrained and overwhelmed during orientation, and I unfortunately left with a negative outlook on my decision to come to Ohio State. How am I supposed to know what classes to take? Am I really qualified to take honors biology? Should biology, calculus, and chemistry be taken together during my first collegiate semester? I received poor instruction regarding these things and my GPA suffered after my first year at Ohio State. I realized after a few lectures in my honors biology class that I was the only student that had not taken AP Biology in high school, simply because it wasn’t offered at my high school. Yikes!! I missed the professors’ expectations dramatically. There is so much that I know now that I wish I could have told my younger self. Sometimes I get frustrated and I think that maybe if I had received better guidance at orientation about my chosen classes, then I wouldn’t have a danger zone GPA looming over my head, but I have to thank this experience more than resent it. I learned a lot of valuable lessons in my first year at Ohio State, and I truly grasped the necessity to fail before the capability to succeed.
I learned that skipping class is a big, bad idea. I would brush off the 8:00am calculus lecture because I knew the notes would be available from one of my diligent study buddies. And I took calculus in high school so I already knew everything, right? I was sorely mistaken. I occasionally sleep through my alarm and end up running to my 9:10am’s this semester, but I have learned how important it is to prioritize going to class and giving the material your undivided attention for those 55 or 80 minutes.
I learned that making flashcards is a sure way of failing a biology exam that asks you to conceptualize and analyze. My biology exams in high school were definition based, so why wouldn’t it be the same in college? *buzzer* The score on my first biology exam suffered because I was simply not connecting the dots. I learned that sitting in the SEL library for 8 hours on the Saturday prior to the Monday exam was far less valuable than studying every day 1 week before the exam for 1-2 hours. Quality > Quantity rules the methods of efficient studying, and flash cards are useless for trying to understand the sigmoidal hemoglobin curve.
I learned that everything counts. I think back to places where I missed a few silly points in my chemistry lab or on chemistry homework, and how that could have constituted the small percentage difference between the B+ that I received and the A- I could have received. Never take anything for granted.
Most importantly, I learned that I can’t do it all. I went to the activities fair on the oval during the first week of classes, eager to join some amazing organizations, and I wound up joining 3 different Pre-Med clubs and having 20+ emails the next week from way too many organizations that I had minimal interest in. I have spoken to other students and I know that they suffered from the same behavior. As high achievers, we think we need to put our eggs in 10 different baskets and it is the only way we can achieve our goals. I learned that it is so much better to choose a few different organizations that you are passionate about than having back-to-back meetings every week night.
I am by no means an expert on all-things-college after learning from many failures during my first year at Ohio State. But I know that I came into my second year with wisdom from these experiences that has allowed me to be more successful in all of my endeavors during my second year. My first impression at orientation was quickly absolved by all of the amazing experiences I have had and the amazing people that I have met during my first year as a college student.