Expectations vs. Reality Essay
As my first semester here at the University of Maryland comes to a close, my first semester in the Science and Global Change Scholars Program is coming to an end as well. This semester, although almost fully virtual, has been an interesting and fun introduction to both the university as well as college life. Reflecting back on my experience in Science and Global Change (SGC) over the past few months, some of my expectations going into the program and college life in general were proven to be true while others were completely false.
First regarding my classes, they have been more or less what I expected upon coming to the University of Maryland. The complexity of my classes as well as the workload were both pretty much what I had expected going into college. Since I had taken AP classes in high school, I had a slight head start in some of the introductory courses I had to take this semester. The biggest change in the reality of school this year was the transition to online classes. This hugely differs from my initial perception of college classes where I would be sitting in a lecture hall with 200-300 other students. Since all my lecture classes were virtual due to the Coronavirus, the structure and delivery of all these classes were vastly different than any class I had taken previously. Some of my classes, including Math135 and Chem131 were all taught synchronously while others including Bsci207 were not. This introduction of asynchronous classes really tested my poor procrastination habits early in the semester but after I got into the swing of things and learned how to better manage my time, I was able to succeed in these courses as well. Three of my courses including Chem132, Univ100, and Comm107 were in person which proved to be a great break from staring at my laptop screen and allowed me to meet new people. Even though these courses were in person they still did not match my expectation of “normal” college classes. Students had to sit 6 feet apart, we all had to wear masks, and classes were limited to under 20 people. Regarding the grading policy in college I was shocked to see how much of my grade was based on test scores (especially the final). In some of my classes homework and classwork assignments that took hours to understand and complete barely affected my overall grade.
Coming into SGC, I thought the course would fully be about climate change, global warming, and ways in which we as individuals can help out. I thought there would be some emphasis on rocks and geology since both of the instructors are part of the geology department. Even though these expectations were true to an extent, a majority of the first semester was spent speaking on what science is, the scientific method/ experimentation, and pseudoscience. The HTML coding portion of the course was definitely unexpected as well. Even though it was sort of a challenge to figure out in the beginning, seeing my completed website was defiantly rewarding and has taught me some much-needed problem solving skills. With this semester being online we were not able to take part in Scholars sponsored out-of-classroom activities but hopefully this changes in the future. Despite most of my expectations being proved wrong, I enjoyed being a part of SGC and look forward to what will be taught next semester.
Life as a University student definitely differed from my over glamorized expectations of college life. Coming into college I had expected to live on campus with a roommate, join a lot of interesting clubs, and form relationships with new people. Because of the Coronavirus a lot of these things were not able to happen. Even though I was on campus, living in Centerville Hall, this semester we were not given roommates and a lot of the activates to help you meet new people were unfortunately canceled. Despite this, I was able to join a few clubs including club tennis and the American Society of Women in Medicine that have been really fun and have allowed me to interact with other people. Additionally, since I am an in-state student living close to the university, there wasn’t really an initial shock of coming to a completely new place.
My advice to incoming SCG students would be to interact with as many students in your class as possible. Since you will be spending the next two years working together it is important to find people who you work well with as well as make new friends. With this semester being online and other semesters unsure of whether or not they will be back in person, meeting new people has definitely been a challenge. Scholars is a great and really useful place to meet new people who have mostly the same interests. I would also recommend that incoming SGC students take part in the activities set by scholars and the scholars advisory board. This is also another way to meet new people as well as have fun. Regarding overall college life, I would advise incoming students to make sure they find a healthy balance between doing work and focusing on your mental and physical health.