Cali Native

Introduction
I am actually from out of state. I am from California. I came out here because I wanted a new experience. I came out and visited in the springtime. I really liked the Quad and campus and I thought, it’s four years of my life, why not go somewhere different.

It’s a little different at first. The students all new each other from high school and I had to kind of break into their friendships. I had to find my own kind of niche. It was really easy because everyone is so nice. Everyone wanted to know about me, and how I’m from California, and if everyone is like Baywatch out there. It was fun just meeting them and telling them where I am from.

Campus Life and Social Life
I would say there is a lot of diversity in the sense of the different majors and the people that get involved in the different activities. I didn’t really see it in high school so it is kind of nice to see that people are exploring different avenues in college. They are all pretty welcoming.

I try to sleep as much as I can. I hardly get out of bed. My workload was pretty easy because of the general education classes. But when I started getting into my Major, the classes got smaller and more intense. I definitely enjoyed them but it was a lot more work. I definitely stayed up later doing more work than I did in high school.

Surprisingly enough I’m in the sailing club in the Midwest. Coming from California, I didn’t think I would get the chance to sail in the middle of cornfields. There is a lake about an hour away. We compete against other Midwest schools like Michigan and Wisconsin. We’ll go out to other lakes too, like Lake Michigan. It is a group of 10 people and it’s really close. We take road trips and barbeque out near the lake. It makes it easier to meet people too, by joining clubs or a sorority, since I’m from out of state. Academics
I didn’t think of myself as a sorority girl at all. I didn’t think I would rush. But since everyone does it here, I think 30 percent of the students that rush are Greek, it turns out that I really enjoyed it. It makes me go out rather than study all the time.

For the first part of school, I did athletic training. It reminded of back in high school when everyone would go to the football games and cheer. I missed that. I was glad that as a Big 10 school, you really get to get involved in the sports. You feel like you are a part of it. It makes it a little less big. There are so many people that go out for the games and want to tailgate.
Tailgating is when everyone stands outside of the stadium and brings their vans and portable barbeques and will have brats and hot dogs and hamburgers and beer. We basically get a little rowdy for the whole game so we can stand for the whole game.

Student Body
I guess the dating scene for me is just a lot of dating. I came to college not really wanting a relationship so I guess I just kind of played the field. It is pretty easy to kind of just hook up once and never see the person again. Now that I am a senior, I am in a relationship. It wasn’t that easy to find him. You just have to find someone with the same interests.

In Closing...
I’m actually graduating in 4 years but a lot of my friends are graduating in 5. It’s hard to finish everything. There are so many opportunities and different Majors that U of I offers that you find yourself switching a lot of the time. I know that I went from athletic training to wanting to go to graduate school. Now I am off to Boulder to go to school.