Now here is a very interesting question...
I am on the verge of my fourth year of college, so I don't exactly qualify as a freshman, but I thought I'd take a crack at this nonetheless.
It is very hard for me to look back to when I was entering college to try and remember my expectations. It seems to me that whenever these sorts of questions are posed, I can't recall any expectations. More often then not, life ends up as I imagined, mostly. So there isn't a whole lot to report as far as that goes...
BUT.. I have learned a few things. One is that work is what you make it. And when I say work, I mean labor, not your "job". Anything that involves physical/mental activity that you are *required* to do (thus, it is possible to enjoy it..). I say this because in my three years of college and various jobs, I have come to realize that a very large number of people in this world are any of lazy/unmotivated/stupid. I don't mean this harshly.
I'm having a hard time getting my thought across, so I'm just going to say it: People don't work as hard in the real world as you are lead to believe. This is not to say there aren't hard working people out there, but in general, there is a slower pace then I expected. In the few jobs I have had, there has been such low expectations of me that I truly couldn't understand how I could possibly do so little in so much time. Take an example:
I worked for a summer video taping sewers. I know, sounds disgusting... but it was a learning experiences, and I'd do it again in a heartbeat. Point is, the first day I showed up for work with my friend/co-worker. We were told that the equipment was in the shop, and that we should head out and peruse the town in an attempt to farmiliarize ourselves with the street names and general
geography. This we did with gusto. We drove around for hours... three total, I think, laughing the whole time at how we were pulling the wool over our boss's eyes by taking such a long time to learn the town (the place had a population of 4000.. not a big place). When we finally wandered back into the town office, our boss looked up in surprise.
"Done already? The last guys took two days..."
So you get the general idea. I was completely shocked. Maybe this is the wrong node to be noding this in, but it's something I have learned in my college experience, so...
The *other* thing I have learned in college is this: Everything is relative. Case in point: My freshmen year at college I was required to take lab chem, lab bio, lab physics and a calc class each semester to fill the core science requirment. This was heavy shit for a
smartass like me who graduated
valedictorian of his puny little high school without ever doing much work. Needless to say, the grades were more of the B minus sort then of the A plus sort. I didn't do horribly, but to me it was quite bad. Ever since then, I have improved my grades slowly. Each semester has been better. Here's the rub: This last semester, I did not attend a single lecture after feb. break, Which basically means I missed a month and a half of each of my five classes. I don't know *why* I did this, I just did. I had a horrible case of sleepitis. I was probably depressed, even though I was in a jolly mood for most of that time. But here is the thing: I *still* improved my grades, getting the highest scores of my entire college career. Four A's out of five.. (and a B+), go figure. So, everything is relative. If this had been the work I had to do
freshman year, would I have gotten four A's even if I *had* gone to class? Probably not. I'm a different person now, even though I always like to say that I don't feel like anything in my head is any different then when I was in
pre-school.
Everything is relative.