How different is college/university from high school?

[Omnis]

and, while we're at it, we might as well compare career/adult-life.

 

[Kylehnat]

How different is college from high school? Very. The classes are harder, there is much more work involved, and the stakes are higher. There is also more beer.

How does career/adult-life compare to kid life? Not as fun, but it pays a hell of a lot better, and there's no homework. Unlike the 17 years you spend in school, there are no real "checkpoints" once you get out. There are no midterm exams, and no definite finish line. Be that as it may, every two weeks you're reminded why you do it . There is also more beer.

 

[Sage]

How different is college from high school?

Quite.

• If you never had to study for a test in high school, then good for you – just means it’ll take you longer to learn how to study for college, because you will have to study.

• In your lower-division classes, most of your professors will not know your name, and in fact won’t recognize your face at all. Office hours are the only way to get them to know you.

• Living away from your parents is awesome, but don’t let the freedom catch up to you – I see way too many kids who completely lose focus because the freedom gets to their heads.

• Tests are everything. In high school, you can do poorly on tests and still get an A in a class; in college, oftentimes your tests account for 80%+ of your grade (in my math class tests are 100% of your grade).

• Study groups seem like a stupid idea in high school (I resented my Calculus teacher for making us do that), but they’re very important in college – you’ll be relying on your peers a lot for help. It definitely helps if the people you’re living with are in similar majors as you.

• Get used to professors who have thick accents – if you can’t understand half of what they’re saying, too bad.

• Walking to class between bells in high school is as strenuous as blinking compared to the kind of walking you’ll do in college if you’re at a large campus. I quite literally have classes that are over a mile apart from each other (I’ve measured), and the passing period is only ten minutes. My bike is my best friend.

• Nobody cares if your car broke down on the way to a midterm – the professor certainly won’t care.

• And speaking of that, don’t ever count on pity in college.

• People are generally nicer at college, because you’re with a group of people who are roughly at the same intellect level as you, while in high school there’s a huge stratification that causes a lot of tension.

• … but the downside of this is that if you’re with a bunch of smart people, and your grades are curved, you better hope you’re smart-smart instead of just smart. You have no dumb people to take the brunt of the curve.

• Another thing that goes with this is that there are very few class clowns or people otherwise causing disruptions – if you disrupt a lecture, everybody will hate you.

• People smoke at college. A lot more than you’d expect. And drink beer. A lot more than you’d expect (especially if they’re frat-boys).

• Generally speaking, a college student’s day is shifted several hours ahead (or behind, depending on your point of reference) of a high school student’s day. In high school, it’s pretty common for somebody to wake up at 6 AM and go to bed at midnight; in college, it’s pretty common for somebody to wake up at 9 AM and go to bed at 3 AM.

• Parking is absolute hell at most large colleges. And expensive.

• And probably the most important point, and leading back to my first point: in high school, each day you spend a bajillion hours in class, and about two seconds on homework. In college, each day you spend a few hours in class, a bajillion hours doing homework, and a bajillion hours studying. Such is life.

 

[Purple Platypus]

Main differences between college and high school...
1. Nights go sooo much later. Whether it's for better or for worse doesn't really matter.
2. Work is harder. There may simply be *more* of it, or it can be impossible to understand, or it can be both. (bad late nights)
3. Life can be so much fun, so long as you can manage something resembling social skills. And I'm not just talking about frat parties, either. (good late nights)

This is all given the fact that I'm in school across the country from home. If I were right there, it'd probably be at least a little different on the first and last points. But college life is definitely more independent (again, for better or worse). Example would be the fact that I just sliced open the back of my finger and got 4 stitches in it, and am still wondering when and how much I should tell my parents =\

 

[Boundary Layer]

Apart from the points Sage mentioned, all of which are very very true (particularly points 1 and 6 in my own experience), your whole concept of time will change. This is parly related to Sage's last point.

An 8 or 9 hour school day with a 45min lunch was the norm for me in highschool, and it was tolerable, and often seemed to fly past.
At university/college, it is customary to have a schedule with 3-5hrs of class per day (sometimes less) with large chunks of time off inbetween - and this is welcomed since a mere 3 hours of straight lecture can melt your brain.

On Fridays this term I have my first class at 10:30am, my second at 11:30. Then 2 hours off, followed by a 3 hour design lab/lecture which often gets cut short at a little over 2 hours time. That's my busiest day of the week, and only consists of 4 or 5 hours in the classroom. Even so, I come home feeling much more drained than I ever did after a day of class in highschool. The lectures are much more intensive and require your full attention.
​

Another few points:

• It's not uncommon to see C students in highschool become A students in university, and vice-versa.
• When you get to university, nobody cares how cool you were in highschool. It's a whole new ball game, and the rules have changed. Jerks are usually labelled as 'jerks' rather than that 'cool guy who everyone wishes they were friends with'.
• In highschool, the library is the most boring place in existence and is to be avoided at all costs. In university you will voluntarily head there to meet with classmates or find a quiet place to study.
  • you'll realize that librarians are not snarly old ladies whose sole purpose is to make you be quiet, but they are infact extremely helpful and knowledgable people.
  In highscool, you go to class because you have to. In university, you go to class because you have to. Despite the wording, there is a definite difference here.

 

[skip0110]

College rules. Unlike high school, where you are forced to learn within extremely tight boundaries, in college you learn things you actually want to know. Which means you really aren't "studying" at all.

Also, you have plenty of freedom with your schedule. This semester, for example, I have Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Fridays off.

 

[DustDriver]

I prefer college over high school. I don't really study more than in high school and i have more days off.

 

[Keef]

I hate college, and that's the worst attitude you could possibly have if you want to do well. In highschool you actually fell aquainted with people, friends, and even your teachers. You're comfortable because you know everyone, and you migh thave known them ever since 1st grade. Now, you can definitely make friends in college, but the way your schedule may be set up there won't be as much time spent with your new friends.

Personally, I just don't feel close to anyone at college. I don't like being on my own, but that's just not my style. There are plenty of people who love making new friends and taking on the huge changes from highschool to college, but I'm just not good at it.

But some of the classes are truly interesting. But it may take a while to dvance to those very interesting and focused classes, or they may not be included in your major at all.

I haven't had to study too much more than I did in highschool, but I'm not going to a big, fancy, demenading college either. Homework could be study time, but I rarely dwell over my notebook. Expect a very different and much more demanding study schedule of you're going to a "proper" university.

 

[Touring Mars]

Most people go to college because they want to be there, whereas alot of people at school don't want to be there at all... it makes an enormous difference.

 

[Danoff]

How University is Better

• You study what you're interested in rather than what the school makes you study.
• You learn with people who are interested in what you are.
• You don't have to put up with as many morons.
• Your teachers are typically innovators in the field, as opposed to high school teachers who are typically high school teachers for a reason.
• You're learning really important things.
• No parents.
• There are tons of beautiful women, most of whom have no pre-conceived notions about you.
• In fact, most people in college don't have any pre-conceived notions about you.
• When you're done, if you had a decent major, you've learned something that you can use to make serious cash, while keeping your life cushy.
• High school is daycare, college is education.

How University is Worse if you have a Decent Major

• It's a lot harder to stand out, because you're suddnely surrounded by people as smart as you are. Think of the best students in you classes. Now consider the fact that there are umpteen billion high schools and that each of these will send kids like those to college. You're in a class full of the top students from your high school.
• Your teachers may be brilliant, but they don't teach. They do this for a reason, too many of you enrolled and the university doesn't want to graduate all of you. Either that's the reason or it's because they can't teach well, or simply don't care. Either way, you're stuck teaching yourself the material.
• Class isn't where you learn, class is where you scribble notes quickly so that you can teach them to yourself later. Learn how to take good notes because you'll need them later.
• You have no idea how to do your homework.
• Tests don't necessarily cover the same thing the instructor lectured on.
• TA's are typically foreign and can barely speak english. Good luck.
• Office hours are where you go to get chastized by your instructor for not paying attention during his confusing lecture.
• Homework counts for nothing, but you do it because you're trying to learn for the test.
• In college, you actually do need to know how to study.
• Your roommates aren't nearly as interested in learning as you are.
• They screw you at the bookstore. By the 2nd or 3rd year you'll start waiting to buy books until the 2nd week of class so that you know for sure the proff is serious when he says book X is required for the class.
• High school is daycare, college is education.

How University is Worse if you have an Easy Major

• You'll waste 4 years of your life partying and doing drugs.
• Your degree isn't worth the paper it's printed on.
• You'll realize that you're barely qualified for the manager's position at McDonalds.
• You'll owe tens of thousands for dollars and have almost nothing to show for it.
• If you're smart, you'll sign up for more education when you get your first (and maybe second) degree. The PhD is worth something even in the weakest fields.
• If you're stupid, you'll decide to get a job as a secretary after graduating and you'll live your life thinking it's unfair that you're not as successful as others, and that you did everything right and there's something wrong with the system.

There's a lot at stake in college, your entire future. Try to take it seriously.

How Graduate School Is Different from College

• They actually want you to get the degree
• The work is harder, but there's less of it and you're more interested in it so it doesn't feel harder.
• If you're a TA, or if you picked the wrong proffessor to be your thesis advisor, you're a slave.
• The graduate degree will help SOOOO much for finding the right job.
• If you're in law school, you get one shot at your grade - the final. That's it, nothing else matters. Don't have a bad day.
• You're the dumbest person in your class.
• Good grades are easier to find.
• Be prepared to see a whole new side of your professors, they'll see you as a human being rather than a moron.

 

[Sage]

• You have no idea how to do your homework.

More true than any high schooler could ever imagine (certainly more than I thought). Trying to do my chem homework correctly is like trying to find gold by sticking a pen into mud (the general chem series are used as weeder courses here, since so many people at SD are life science majors).

 

[Omnis]

Well, you guys got me all excited about the moronless environment, but I'm beginning to crap my pants over Sage's comment about the chem homework.

 

[Danoff]

Well, you guys got me all excited about the moronless environment, but I'm beginning to crap my pants over Sage's comment about the chem homework.

You'll be ok, because my comment applies to pretty much everyone. Nobody knows how to do their homework. Pretty much everyone will be clueless.

In my early physics classes, exam averages were in the 30's. An "A" was set at 38% or so. Of course, there were the folks who managed negative scores, but that's another story.

 

[Boundary Layer]

Well, you guys got me all excited about the moronless environment, but I'm beginning to crap my pants over Sage's comment about the chem homework.

Well what Sage and Danoff say is very true. In any program there are courses designed specifically to get the weak students to drop out.

For my mechanical engineering degree it is Thermodynamics I, Caclulus II, and Physics II. All 3 courses are typically taken in the first year of the program. At other universities in Canada offering the same degree, Thermodynamics is usually offered as a third or fourth year course, and the material I learned in physics II is often not taught at all since it is completely unrelated.

 

[Danoff]

Physics and Calculus were weed-outs for me, but I absolutely loved Thermo. Of course that was one of the few classes where everyone came to me for explanation.

 

[Boundary Layer]

oh ya, Thermodynamics is a great subject. Of the core engineering topics that I've studied, it and heat transfer are likely my favourites. However, when Thermo I is taken here students don't have all the background knowledge and insight necessary to get a firm grasp of the subject. The haze wasn't lifted for me until 3rd year when I took Heat Transfer, Advanced Fluid Mechanics, Thermodynamics II, and Energy Conversion Utilization (Thermo III). It'd be a much easier course to follow if it had Heat Transfer and Fluid Mechanics as prerequisites to it.

Actually, Thermodynamics was my very first university course. I remember that because I got lost trying to find the lecture theatre on my first day.

 

[CDailey]

What everyone has said so far is true. Even at a community college. It's great though and you'll love it.

 

[ROAD_DOGG33J]

I'm not looking forward to college. I was thinking about becoming a pharmacist, engineer or accountant. I decided that pharmacy would take too long and engineering is probably too hard. So I hope accounting isn't too bad. I'm taking the class now in high school and it seems interesting enough.

 

[Danoff]

and, while we're at it, we might as well compare career/adult-life.

How High School is Different From Adult Life

• To adults, things that matter actually matter and things that don't matter, actually don't. (example: Whether or not you can convert units, multiply, or do basic algebra, allow you to plan your finances, and hold down a decent job. Whether or not you have the latest shoes, or wear the same clothes as the new coolest musician, barely factor into your life at all).
• To adults, good things are actually good and bad things are actually bad. (example: If you go to work and work hard, people respect you and you have something to show for it - whereas in high school respect is gotten by smoking pot and lighting stuff on fire).
• Adults have less time, but it's used more wisely.
• Adults have freedom AND responsibility. In high school you typically have one or the other.
• Time moves faster when you're not staring at the clock all day making spit-balls and drawing swords and snakes on your notebook. When you start working, a year will go by as you barely realize it. You'll start to think of Christmas as something that happens quite often. And suddenly being 10 years older feels like a real and indeed inevitable possibility.
• The world makes more sense when you're an adult. This is because your priorities become properly adjusted, and typically because you've learned a thing or two.
• When you're in high school, you try to avoid adults at all costs. When you're an adult, you try to avoid teenagers at all costs.
• Work is far more rewarding than sitting in class (if you like your job).
• Making money is way better than not making money.
• Being married is SOOOOOOOO much better than dating.

Basically, life only gets better if you're doing it right (at least from my point of view, I'm not super old yet so I don't know anything about old age). Because of the fact that life gets better, it also speeds up... alot.

If you ever think to yourself that you'd rather be back where you were a few years ago, you've done something wrong. If anyone tells you "you'll think of high school/college as the best years of your life", they've either done something horribly wrong with their lives, or they aren't thinking about it hard enough.

 

[Kylehnat]

How University is Better

• You have no idea how to do your homework.

. True dat. Ever take a course on process control and system dynamics?

Even better: in college, you often have no idea how to do your exam questions, either . There's nothing better than starting a final exam, seeing that you have 2 hours to complete 3 problems, and not having a clue as to how to do any of them. Good times.

 

[Danoff]

. True dat. Ever take a course on process control and system dynamics?

I took a course on controlling dynamic systems. It was a real bear. Very confusing.

 

[Kylehnat]

Trying to do my chem homework correctly is like trying to find gold by sticking a pen into mud

...and you're not even to the good stuff!

High school chemistry:

College chemistry:

 

[Omnis]

...and you're not even to the good stuff!

High school chemistry:

College chemistry:

Something about psychology, eh? I'm taking Chemistry again this year just to buff up my skills (and my GPA )... I wish I could've went to AP Chem II instead.

 

[wfooshee]

The number one difference between high school and college has been inferred but not stated: self-discipline, self-motivation. I had neither, and went from 7th in my class in high school to almost flunking out of university. I backed off, went to school part-time and worked, eventually gave up and never finished my degree. (My parents' divorce and the resulting dry-up of funds figured into it, but this was about the time the Apple II came out, and I got into small computers really big. Now I profitably build servers and networks for a living, so I got lucky.)

You get lectures, materials, and assignments. That's it. You have to read, do the problems, when they don't work you have to figure out why. All by yourself, or in your study group. No study group? Been nice knowin' ya.

There is no hand-holding, no fallbacks, no "Maybe this was too much at one time." The material is presented, then it's used as the basis for the next day's class as if it was something you'd known since you were five and had always taken for granted. And the professor WILL take for granted that you know the material.

If you can't do it yourself, you can't do it.

 

[fatman_5050]

...and you're not even to the good stuff!
College chemistry:

Hmmm...I should know that one. Schroedinger's equation?

Everyone here brings up some good points, if you don't go to your lectures at college, I'd say 75% of the time you are not going to pass the class. Sure there might be easy classes, usually first semester/quarter of first year, but don't get iinto the mindset that you don't need to go to class to pass the midterms and finals. That's about what I did for a couple quarters, now I am back doing the same classes again because they are required to continue in my proposed major. Trust me, it's no fun having to sit through the same things because you couldn't be bothered to get to class the first time through.

The benefit to college is that if you have an interest in a certain area, you'll probably find a course on it. If you do, that course might feel a lot less like a hassle, and more like something you enjoy going to every day. I took a Russian course and a Norse myth course for these reasons, and I don't think I've had more fun in any other classes.

 

[1X83Z]

The only differences are that I don't live at home and I haven't got a car. The academic challenge is very similar.

Oh and I live with someone.

 

[Slick Rick]

Is College in the US the same as a University in the UK? Because college in the UK is something else.

 

[Danoff]

Is College in the US the same as a University in the UK? Because college in the UK is something else.

Yes, generally college and university mean the same thing in the US. Community college means something else.

 

[1X83Z]

What? College and university are different.

A 'college' is undergraduate education. I attend Emory College, which is a part of Emory University. 'University' refers to all the schools at Emory - which include a graduate-level medical school, a graduate-level business school, a graduate-level law school, and others. Schools that are universities - like, the University of Alabama for instance - traditionally have numerous graduate and undergraduate colleges within them. Meanwhile schools that are colleges - like, Williams College - typically have just an undergraduate program. There are exceptions to that last bit, but typically only for colleges which are very old and don't want to change their name - like the College of William and Mary, or Dartmouth College.

 

[McLaren]

[/INDENT]Another few points:

• It's not uncommon to see C students in highschool become A students in university, and vice-versa.

This always surprised me, and every teacher I've asked has no real answer except for maybe they found a schedule or set of classes they're more set for.