I am not sure what I was expecting in the College Park Scholars: Science and Global Change program. When I first got accepted into the University of Maryland, I was excited to also have been accepted into a distinguished program. I was hesitant while comparing the honors program and the scholars program due to seeing that the honors program was more "academically orientated" and that the scholars program was more "service oriented". Although I enjoy giving back to society, I really wanted to be able to take honors-level courses. Now that I've been through one semester of college and have heard the experiences of my peers who are in the University Honors program, I see that the program may be less fulfilling than being a part of this program would be. Hearing other students talking about their experiences taking classes for programs that they felt were unnecessary and tedious, I feel lucky to have been a part of a program that both does not demand too much of me while having, what I believe, are interesting and worthwhile lectures.

As for the course, I was not sure what "Science and Global Change" entailed. I at first expected that the program would teach how to enact change on a global scale in regards to combating climate change. In reality the lectures go more in depth on the history of the Earth's climate than I expected. The colloquies are a little awkward. Many times I feel bad for people giving questions due to only having a few of the members in the discussion participate while the others are too shy to contribute. This sometimes times leads to situations where they attempt to get the more silent members to speak up. The coursework for CPSG100 is what I expected for a 1 credit meet-once-a-week course. It is not unreasonably demanding and has very educational lectures.

The expectations for my other classes are pretty much met in terms to the feel of taking lectures and having professors be very hands-off compared to the teachers of that past. One thing that is very different and a little stress-inducing is how there are fewer assignments given. In this way each individual assignment influences your grade more. Not all of my classes are like this in structure. COMM107, Oral Communications: Principals and Practices, seems like a high school class in terms of structure. With small class sizes and regular classes, the class structure is very similar to high school ones.

Life as a college student is a lot lonelier than I imagined, although that could just be my own experience. In high school, you knew where mostly your friends would be during certain times of the day and how to find them. In addition, it was really simple to find out where they lived and figuring out how to meet regularly. In contrast, friends in college and seeing them regularly is a little bit of a struggle for me. I don't want to be the guy that always asks to hang out and sometimes people don't ask if I'm free. It's a little harder being from New Jersey as well since it feels like almost everyone here came from Maryland and knows everyone else through connections growing up. Living in Centreville as well makes it hard to stay within the loop of my friends who live near each other in the Ellicot Community.

My advice to future SGC students, especially those out of state, is to just try your hardest to make one or two friends and have them introduce you to the people they know. A lot of people have prior close connections with others from high school, especially if they're from Maryland.