Georgia Institute of Technology-Main Campus Top Questions

I would tell myself to prepare for the workload. You need to study hard and go to class. Get involved and don't be afraid to branch out. Wait to see if you need books, before you buy them, and take advantage of professors' office hours.

Don’t come to college with the idea that you’ll float around and eventually make plans for your life. Enjoy your summer. Be prepared to hit the ground running. For four years, you will be going nonstop. Don’t expect it all to be fun. You’re driven, so it won’t be. You will be miserable at times, but the highs outweigh the lows. People who say college will be the best time of your life floundered around while they were here. College won’t be the best time for you. You will work hard and have a great time. Your life after college won’t steadily decline, but exponentially rise. Work hard so that no matter what point you are in life, you can say, “This is the best time!” Life is too great a gift to waste it longing for days gone by. I’d like to say that life will get easier after graduation, but it won’t. However, you’ll be making a difference and pursuing your passion. You know this is the only way to achieve true happiness. Don’t be afraid to make memories in college but never forget your ultimate goal.

Looking back on my years as a college undergraduate, I would tell myself to be prepared to enjoy some of the most memorable, challenging, and inspiring years that will shape your character for the years following. The people you meet and classes you take will be one of a kind. Be as immersive in you learning experience as much as possible. You will push youself past the boundaries of your current intellect and be intrigued with new passions. College is a time that you will find out more about yourself; your likes and dislikes may change. As long as you strive for the best, you'll land exactly where you want to be. Enjoy college, but be ready to take it all in and make the most of it.

Go to Georgia Tech!!

A college degree should set you up with a career that lets you get what you want out of life. To fully understand this advice, you first need to understand what a college degree is. It's a significant monetary and temporal investment in future opportunities. Those future opportunities directly constitute your career, but indirectly relate to whatever it may be that you want to do away from work. I'm a firm believer that most high school seniors don't know exactly what they want to get out of life, which leads to my advice on how you should spend your time in college. You should ensure you have as many opportunities as possible, when you leave college. This is done by working hard in the classroom and coming away with the best knowledge base you can. However, you should also ensure that upon your graduation you have a much better idea about what you want to get out of life. At the end of the day, college is about opportunities. Your time there should be spent taking advantage of as many of them as possible, but also used to ensure that your future is filled with them.

My advice to a younger me would be to work on my self confidence and to step out of my comfort zone. In high school, I didn't believe that I could get into my top schools because I was worried I was not good enough. I was safe with the schools and scholarships I applied to because rejection terrified me, and I thought the rejection would put a limit to what I was capable of. In college, I realized that I create my own limits. My peers have pushed me to accomplish goals I never would have thought possible. Since last year, I have joined a sport I had never heard of, researched graduate level information, and held project presentations with an audience full of faculty members. I was terrified of making myself uncomfortable in high school, but now I thrive on it. If I had stepped out of my comfort zone in high school, I would have had a chance to have great experiences and push myself earlier. My sister is a high school senior now, and I tell her she is capable of so much more that what she thinks is possible.

Going back to my high school senior self, the first thing I would say is do not underestimate what is to come. College is full of challenges and struggles that you will have to overcome academically. Thinking that everything will be a breeze because it was in high school, is absolutely wrong. College will teach you so much about yourself and how to work to your best ability and while high school started you on that path, college will be sure to tell you if you were going in the right direction, and fast! So when you start college, expect the unexpected, learn to figure out what is most important to you and how to work hard and still enjoy every experience you have. You are the captain of the next four, five or maybe even six years of your life and you should live them with no regrets. Time management is key. Working hard is extremely important. Seizing opportunities and enjoying them is essential. Get ready for the time of your life, and make sure you remember to read your textbooks even when you would rather watch Grey's Anatomy!

To my high school self, BE YOURSELF! I know it is so easy to come into college thinking you know who you want to be, convinced that your major will never budge, and sturdy in all of your values and views on life. These are the elements you think you are and you think you want to portray, but this does not mean you are truly being yourself. Being yourself is putting yourself out there in new situations. Do something you have never heard of; join a club that makes you excited. Being yourself in college doesn't mean being who you want to be. It means finding out who you can be and doing the most you can to live up to that potential. Stay focused, be nice to your family, and don't get lazy! Sincerely, Your Future Self PS: Feel free to contact me through way of meditation, exploring yourself now, and living in the present to let it lead the way to the future.

This is hard to do in 200 words because there are so many things I did wrong. However, they all made me a stronger person and so many of my mistakes led to who I am today. I'm a completely different person than you are now. We fail a class our first semester that still haunts us to this day. We lost HOPE scholarship and the student debt is unbelievable. This makes us stronger though. We retake that class and meet a teacher that opens our eyes to the world of math and science. We meet one of our best friends that inspires us to work hard and pursue our goals. Looking back I wouldn't trade that class for the money (or anything). With the financial trouble we have to take a semester off and finish our associates in 3 years not 2. This ends up being the best thing to ever happen because we meet our future wife in the class we take our last semester. She's beautiful and smart don't ever let her go. Work hard Jon, no one is going to do it for you. Georgia Tech is where you belong! Good luck.

Speaking to my former self, I'd encourage myself to pay close attention to all of the activities I enjoyed in high school and middle school and not give them up. I love to sing and I was a tutor in high school. There's no reason why I couldn't have become a tutor in college too, except I just didn't. I'd tell myself to develop an exercise regimen early and stick with it. I'd tell myself to try and make a wider variety of friends sooner rather than later. I shouldn't be afraid to step out of my comfort zone and try my hand at writing for the newspaper or starting a blog. Writing has always been an outlet for me but I neglected it for years. I'd urge myself to listen to my heart and trust in myself. I'm more intelligent than I gave myself credit for. But mostly, I'd tell myself to have fun and be young. I am young; I was young and I should be young. I should make mistakes and learn from them.