This is my very first post! Yay!

It took me forever to decided what to write about, but finally I decided that in my first post want to talk about something very important to my transition into adulthood and my future: my current experience as a first year student attending Zoom University.

On June 1st, 2020, I had finally made one of the most important decision of my life: which college I am going to go too! This decision was a hectic one because for my whole high school career I had committed myself to making an effort to make sure I attend a college outside of my home state of Texas. Why? Because I wanted freedom! I wanted change! I wanted to be able to prove to myself that I can take care of me without any type of parental figure present. I wanted a chance to learn about me. Learn about what I like, what type of friends I want to have, who’s energy I’m attracted to, who I am attracted too, etc. I wanted to be able to explore a different city and become familiar with that place and call it my second home. I wanted to meet new people and make new friends. (I joined the GEMS program for that specific reason, so I could force myself to have to socialize with other individuals) But with all that being said, I also had to think about the current state of emergency that we as a world are in, and how that would affect not only me but my family. I live with my grandparents who are elderly, which means that they are high risk, and me coming home during breaks from another state could pose a dangerous risk for their health. This decision would also prove to be a burden on my mother because she’s a Nurse Practitioner who works for a company that has strict policy on their employees traveling. What that basically means is that the one person who could drop me off at my school would have to miss out on 14 days of paid work in order to quarantine due to travel. And it didn’t help that I got rejected from all of the schools I wanted to go to in Texas, and accepted to all of the school I wanted to go to out of state. So yeah… a very hectic decision to be made.

But with a lot of discussion, planning, focusing on what I wanted and how to make sure I don’t end up being miserable for the next four years of my life, I decided to take a chance and go to one of my top schools: Agnes Scott College! It was a lot of stressful decision making and planning, but ultimately my parents wanted me to make a decision that would leave me happy, and going to ASC was going to make me happy. We figured what else would I have to loose since I already lost the experience of having a prom, senior week, and a graduation.

So there I was planning for my future departure to Decatur, Georgia. I went on Dormify and Target and bought dorm room essentials and decor. I went shopping at ASOS and small online clothing boutique and bought a whole new wardrobe (I wore the same plaid skirt and grey/white shirt for seven years straight, I basically had no clothes because there was no need for any). I bought so many smell good items, and I spent my evenings surfing ‘Please Don’t Snore’, and writing long messages to potential roommates, only to chicken out and delete them at the last minute because my anxiety got the best of me. By the end of July I had 75% of my room decor and essential, pretty good beginner friendly fashion pieces, thousands of masks and sanitizers, plane tickets booked all the way till Thanksgiving Break, and even a roommate (by the magic of God)! I got into the program that I really wanted to get in, and I was able to figure out my finances for college. I had my best friend from high school going to our sister school Spelman College, meaning that I wouldn’t be starting this journey by myself! I was eager to meet my admissions counselor and tell her in person how much I appreciated her helping me through this process, and I was preparing my social anxiety for meeting new people. I was truly ready and excited to experience my first semester of college, and of freedom. But as we all know, on August 2, 2020 an email was sent out letting us know that in fact, there would be no on campus classes, and that we would instead revert to online learning.

I was crushed, but I completely understood. People unfortunately aren’t taking this pandemic seriously, and with Georgia, specifically Atlanta being a hotspot for Covid-19, and only being about 20 minutes away from Decatur, topped with the President of our school catching Covid, the school at to do what’s best for their students and faculty, which is virtual learning.

In the beginning I had high hopes! Okay what if I was still kinda stuck in the routine that I had been in for the past 5 months… it would still be a new systems! Meaning new adventures! New students and new teachers! A different circularcium, one that is tailored to what I want to learn instead of what is required by the state to graduate high school. I had followed some girls in my classes on Instagram so maybe I could somehow make some friends. I was excited! And then we had to communicate, and that’s when the excitement slowly but surely started dwindling. Nobody told me that it would be this hard to form bonds over the internet. I mean with apps like Bumble and Tinder being so popular you would think that it was easy, but it’s not at all. It’s hard! It’s scary! You don’t know what to say and how to say it. You and someone aren’t in person so you can’t access their energy and understand their persona. And on top of that, as someone who has crippling anxiety, being the first one to talk is so mortifying!!!!! Not only that, but the one thing about Agnes that I appreciate so much is that it’s a small school, meaning that it’s a close knit community, and it’s easy to build relationships with your professors. And as someone who comes from a graduating class of 43 students, my biggest success and help as a student, especially a student with severe anxiety, is being able to build a relationship with my professor that way I can feel comfortable enough to come to them for help, and that’s just something I’m not able to build on over the internet.

It’s taken me ( and is still taking me) a while to adjust to this change of learning. With Zoom University I realized a lot of things about myself and the way I learn. One of the most important lessons I’ve learned it that I absolutely have to have friends who are committed to holding me, and also letting me hold them accountable to studying and finishing assignments. Coming from a close knit STEM focused school of all girls, am I used to being in a learning environment surrounded by people who are always checking up on each other and forming study sessions and groups. This is one reason why I chose Agnes because I knew that that would be something easy to do, but it’s only easy to do when you’re in person and able to have actual bonds with people. Without that I find myself struggling to find motivation, and struggling to hold myself accountable to finishing my work on time. I’ve also found myself suppressing myself from answering questions and giving my thoughts and feelings on issues because I don’t want to sound stupid or like a fool. Zoom University is just really hard, and it’s difficult to feel motivated sometimes.

I want to end this post off on this note: I ABSOLUTELY love my school. Though Zoom University is hard and sometimes miserable, I see the effort that my school is putting in and the care that the staff has for their students, and it makes me feels so much joy! I love that I can actually envision myself graduating from here and making being an alumni a big part of my story. But for the moment, in this current time, it sucks not having that full college experience. Zoom University is challenging in every area. And I am still learning, mid-semester, how to balance this unique experience with my life and trying to make it feel positive.