Champlain College Top Questions

College is more than the campus you walk through and the classes you take. It's a time of your life the flies by faster than high school ever did. It's the last time you will ever be made to read and write and do home work. You might feel elated by this as a high school senior, but let me tell you, as a college senior, you are saddened. This is the last time you will ever be made to read and write and do home work. The last time. So enjoy every second of it! Enjoy the all-nighters and the twenty page research papers and the chapters upon chapters of reading, because this is it. Delve into everything your teachers give you. Don't brush it aside. Live it and learn it and question it with vigour. Treat everything you're taught like it's the last thing you'll be taught because in four years that feel like four days, it will be. When you're finally on that stage and you get that diploma, feel grateful and take all you've learned and promise yourself that this is not the end, but the beginning.

I would tell myself to keep doing my work, stay in school even when times are tough and listen to my teachers and parents! There is a whole world out there to discover and good times are ahead of you!

Dear Colleen, At 2:00 PM today, you will officially be a high school graduate. At 2:44 PM, you, still in cap and gown, will be at the town transfer station, selling cold soda in an entrepreneurial effort to make the $2,000 you need to accept your place at your first choice college. Graduation parties can wait—you need to be sure down to the last lucky penny. Don’t worry. You’ll make enough to pay your first semester, and second semester, you’ll pull three nine-hour-days a week to pay it again. And still, don’t worry. Come junior year, you’ll spring the $400 to travel for Spring Break and you’ll make eight new friends working with Habitat for Humanity more than one thousand miles from home. And you’ll still have enough to send home when Rachel has the accident, and you’ll still, somehow, have $2,000 to your name when you start applying for scholarships again before your last year of college. Money isn’t everything. Money isn’t even anything. Make your living, and live your life—don’t worry. Love Colleen

If I could go back in time, my advice would be the obvious stuff. Work harder in high school and you will have a better chance of being successful in college. Teachers always told me that I was doing okay and I hardly put any effort in. I was a B/C student, but you don't realize how hard you need to work until you enter college. I also wish I had focused more on getting better grades. I'm attending a school that costs 44k per year. Scholarships come easier for those who were successful in high school.

Assuming I could return to advise myself as a high school senior, there is one lesson that I would have benefited from immensely. After graduating, I was unsettled about my lack of career and education plan -- I had assumed the path would have become clear by then. Consequently, I spent two years fretfully considering a course of action, feeling as though I had to race to make up for my tardiness. I was unaware until later that this was a common struggle among recent graduates. Were I able to return to that worried eighteen year old, I would explain to her that there is no right or standard path to be taken, that finding the best path for me might take some time, and that education is, really, a journey that should be continued throughout life. I have learned the important lesson that this journey does not end abruptly when the standard stopwatch runs out of time. If I could advise my younger self, I would tell her to take her time, that it is okay, there is no rush. This is one lesson that I would have benefited from, and I want to share it with current students too.

Your closest friends still sometimes make mistakes. Don't write letters when you are angry. Sometimes understanding your perspective means abandoning their own, and they can't just do that because you ask them too (even if you think you are right). If someone is unwilling to bend to fix a problem, you should not be so concerned with your relationship with them. You should not have to bend over backwards for someone who won't bend for you. Your family will be your best friends if you let them and your worst enemies if you don't; get your attitude right. They will always love you. When you need to rock the boat, make sure you don't capsize. It is okay to eat your feelings every now and then, just don't make it a habit. It is okay to revise your beliefs once and a while. It is healthy to admit you are wrong on a regular basis. Ask for help when you need it. Try new things, it will help you get over your fear of change. Enjoy your life, because it is actually pretty cool.

"Don't feel you have to put up with something negative that you have the ability to change." I was placed (as a single child and native Vermonter) in a dorm room with three extremely bossy and disrespectful girls from Massachusettes who all had siblings. This was too much to deal with on top of settling into college and keeping up with my academics. Although my grades didn't slip, my social life was essentially non-existant. I would go home for a weekend to visit my family and get away, and I would come back to find dirty dishes and laundry all over my bed and my space that didn't belong to me. I became very depressed because I wasn't making friends. This was a really dark time for me. Eventually I decided that I'd had enough and made a room change by the second semester. I began making friends and am now currently living with a best friend and roommate of over two years! Having the power to change my environment to suit my needs was a valuable lesson I learned my freshman year, and what a difference it has made.

I haven't started my college experience yet, but I will be very shortly. I hope to gain perspective and a more helpful, friendly attitide towards others.

So far, I've really enjoyed college. I feel like it's really expanding and changing how I think in a very positive way. The lectures, the discussions, I love them both. Just hearing my peers opinions and thoughts, no matter how different from my own, is always a worthwhile experience for me and I'd never stop attending college, no matter what.

As a professional, I was at first scared and anxious to return to college at the age of twenty-six. My experience so far at Champlain College has been both positive and encouraging. The professors are extremely helpful and open. I am constantly motivated to share my opinions and look forward to attendning classes every day. How many students can honestly say that! The benefit to attending college in such a small state/city is that many of the professors have ties to local businesses, allowing students access to internships and job opportunities. I am truly blessed to attend such a beautiful college, nestled in the middle of Lake Champlain and rolling mountains.