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STEM Connectors
Social Belonging Story
Studies have shown that incoming Freshmen students of all ethnicities struggle with adjusting to different aspects and challenges of the new college experience. CCNY STEM Communities platform was developed to help with that transition.
Let us know how you believe experiences can help you advise future CCNY students still transitioning, feel lost or are struggling in their academics during their first year.
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SOCIAL BELONGING ENTRIES
When I first got to the City College of New York (CCNY), I worried that I was different from other students at CCNY. Everyone else seemed so certain that they were right for CCNY, I wasn’t sure I fit in. Sometime after my first year, I came to realize that many people come to CCNY uncertain whether they fit in or not. Now it seems ironic – everybody feels they are different freshman year from everybody else, when really in at least some ways we are all pretty similar. Since I realized that, my experience at CCNY has been almost one-hundred percent positive.
I love City College and I wouldn’t trade my experiences here for anything. I’ve met some close friends, I’ve had some fantastic experiences, and I’ve certainly learned a lot.
Still, I think the transition to college is difficult, and it was for me. My freshman year I really didn’t know what I was doing – I made a lot of casual friends at parties and other social settings and I avoided interacting with professors in class and office hours, I think because I was intimidated by them. It got a lot better once I chose a major I was excited about. I began to make close friends through classes and labs, and I started to get involved in research with one of my professors. Now I am happier than I have ever been at City College. It is really rewarding for me to feel like I belong in the intellectual community here.
I didn’t go to a very good high school, and I worried that my high school courses had not prepared me well for college. Honestly, when I got here, I thought professors were scary. I thought they were critical and hard in their grading, and I worried a lot about how they and other students would evaluate me. I was nervous about speaking in class and I didn’t like other people to read my papers. Around my sophomore year I felt more comfortable – I began to enjoy my classes more and I found some close friends who I trusted. I also became more comfortable speaking in class, and sometimes I asked my friends to edit my papers for me. And I saw that even when professors are critical, or their grading harsh, it didn’t mean they looked down on me or that I didn’t belong. It was just their way of motivating high-achieving [school name] students.
First day at City College I had zero friends and knew zero people, I was extremely nervous and worried I wouldn’t make any friends. But I quickly realized that the majority of the people in my classes were very friendly and super nice. Although, it took me a bit to become comfortable with meeting new people and trying to make friends in my first year I met some really great people, who I now consider to be very close friends of mine. Talking to people and making friends has become a lot easier, I am still very quiet and shy, but my confidence level has increased which is why I find it easier approaching people.
The most difficult transition from high school to the City College of New York was coming from a situation in which I knew every student for the past seven years into a new situation in which I did not know one student before I arrived. Freshman year even though I met large numbers of people, I didn’t have a small group of close friends. I had to work to find lab partners and people to be in study groups with. I was pretty homesick, and I had to remind myself that making close friends takes time. Since then in classes, clubs, and social activities, I have met people some of whom are now just as close as my friends in high school were.