02-08-2012, 01:10 PM
Alright...this is going to be a rather long post.
In a nutshell....college isn't working out for me this time. More specifically, DSU, the college I'm currently attending.
The first four years I was here, from 2006 through 2010, I loved DSU. I had a nice dorm room and I got along with basically anyone I met. I rarely had issues, and when I did, I had them sorted out in no time and I was back on my way. In 2010 though, my grades were starting to fall, and I decided to spend one year back home at a community college on the reservation, known as "Sinte Gleska University". (Sinte Gleska is "Spotted Tail" in Lakota language). I went there, got a one year computer maintenance certificate, and it was really nice to be back home for nearly a year instead of just three months during the summer. After my grades went up, I decided to return to DSU. I was hoping it would be smooth sailing as it was in the past. Sadly, that hasn't been the case this time around.
First off, my dorm. I don't have any form of rental assistance set up at this point, meaning I have to stay in the dorm while I attend DSU. If I got placed in my old dorm I would have been fine for the most part. However, I ended up registering so late last semester that I ended up in a completely different dorm, an all-male dorm to be exact. So, alright. I guess I could live in an all-male dorm. Here is where the problems started. I got placed in a room that was right outside the floor lobby. Because the doors in this dorm aren't soundproofed in any way, I was able to constantly hear the students who would gather outside in the lobby to play their "Madden" football games or other sports games on their PS3's or Xbox 360 consoles, or watch movies. On top of that, these students end up talking about the most repulsive things that I won't even mention in this thread. Every. Single. Night. They just talked and talked and talked even after "quiet hours" were supposed to kick in. That means I couldn't watch my own TV, nor play my own video games in peace. Sure, there was Lilly, and I have a set of headphones that helped drown out the noise a tad, but after awhile, the internet gets boring after checking Facebook and other sites to death. I also didn't have a DVD drive at the time either, so I couldn't watch my own DVD collection. On the upside, I did discover MLP:FIM and I watched the entire first season and the first half of the second.
On top of the noise, these other students were trying to make friends with me, even though I did not agree with their lifestyle. I'm like Fluttershy sometimes...Im afraid to stand up for myself because Im afraid about what would happen next. I was afraid these students would start picking on me if I rejected their friendship, or worse. Thus, I just played along with them and said "Hi" and whatnot. The point being...I felt very uncomfortable.
It got worse. One day when I was walking up to the playhouse for class work, these random students just come by and yell at me to get my attention and they called me a name. It was dusk, and I wasn't sure if these were college kids or just middle/high school kids just picking on random people for fun. Then a few weeks later, it happened again! These kids drove up to me while I was walking to McDonalds, one reached out their hand to me as if they were going to give me something, and then they just drove off laughing. I have no idea what those kids were on or why they just decided to pick on me, but because of these incidents, I now have to keep an eye on every single car that passes me when I am walking around town doing my chores. That just further adds to my stress because to me, I can no longer trust anyone I do not know too well. I do have a lot of trustworthy friends up here, but the people I do not know greatly outnumber the ones that I do know.
Because of all this, my overall motivation to get classwork done started to sink. I do procrastinate to a degree, which I know is a personal problem of mine and I have to address, but this time, I didn't feel like doing the classwork at all. What I did get done was rather poor, and I ended up dropping one class, and failing another.
Christmas break came, and I was very excited to get out of this place Im forced to call "home", and I went back to my real home for a few weeks. I was able to get a room change for the next semester, but that required me to move up to the fourth floor of the dorm. It was away from the lobby though, so that was good to know. I was initially excited to get back up here and have another semester which hopefully would be better than the last one.
I now have been back here for nearly a month, and now, it appears that it won't be the case. For starters, I have an 8am class on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. It's a very interesting class to say the least, but when I show up, I'm sometimes not in the best of shape. The instructor was wanting to move it to Tuesday and Thursday evenings, but because only two people in the class have a job that would conflict with the schedule, he had to keep it M-W-F mornings. On top of that, I have two other classes on M-W-F, and these instructors up here are somewhat more demanding than the ones back at SGU. My morning class usually has an assignment that is usually due the next class period, only giving me less than 48 hours to get it done. So far though, the assignments have been fairly simple, but I have to work for other classes too, which would force me to learn time management. This is something I can fix on my own, but it requires more time to do so. But when you are feeling depressed because of being pressured by questionable people to be their friends, or be subjected to unwanted noise, it really takes away any motivation to do anything.
The new dorm room started out alright, like last semester, but the guys next door are into their First Person Shooter games. They have their TV up so loud the sound goes through the electrical outlet between the walls of the room, and on many nights I can hear their CoD game in my own room. The unwanted noise of gunfire really gets to me. I just want to spend time alone, in my room, without any noise or unwanted intrusions. I guess that will never happen in a place like this.
I have been thinking about dropping out of the college, and returning home before my birthday, perhaps as soon as this coming weekend. I have attended SGU before, and the classes there aren't as demanding as the ones at DSU. I have more leeway in getting my work done, which will allow me to finally get together some sort of time management system. On top of that, I will be at home, at a place where I feel comfortable. I will have family around to support me if something bad should happen.
If I do decide to go home, I will feel guilty. Guilty of abandoning my dream of graduating from DSU, and also guilty of accepting that student loan. But I think the positives will outweigh the negatives. I guess Im more suited in attending a community college rather than a state sponsored institution.
Do you think it would be a good decision to go back home where I can feel happy again?
In a nutshell....college isn't working out for me this time. More specifically, DSU, the college I'm currently attending.
The first four years I was here, from 2006 through 2010, I loved DSU. I had a nice dorm room and I got along with basically anyone I met. I rarely had issues, and when I did, I had them sorted out in no time and I was back on my way. In 2010 though, my grades were starting to fall, and I decided to spend one year back home at a community college on the reservation, known as "Sinte Gleska University". (Sinte Gleska is "Spotted Tail" in Lakota language). I went there, got a one year computer maintenance certificate, and it was really nice to be back home for nearly a year instead of just three months during the summer. After my grades went up, I decided to return to DSU. I was hoping it would be smooth sailing as it was in the past. Sadly, that hasn't been the case this time around.
First off, my dorm. I don't have any form of rental assistance set up at this point, meaning I have to stay in the dorm while I attend DSU. If I got placed in my old dorm I would have been fine for the most part. However, I ended up registering so late last semester that I ended up in a completely different dorm, an all-male dorm to be exact. So, alright. I guess I could live in an all-male dorm. Here is where the problems started. I got placed in a room that was right outside the floor lobby. Because the doors in this dorm aren't soundproofed in any way, I was able to constantly hear the students who would gather outside in the lobby to play their "Madden" football games or other sports games on their PS3's or Xbox 360 consoles, or watch movies. On top of that, these students end up talking about the most repulsive things that I won't even mention in this thread. Every. Single. Night. They just talked and talked and talked even after "quiet hours" were supposed to kick in. That means I couldn't watch my own TV, nor play my own video games in peace. Sure, there was Lilly, and I have a set of headphones that helped drown out the noise a tad, but after awhile, the internet gets boring after checking Facebook and other sites to death. I also didn't have a DVD drive at the time either, so I couldn't watch my own DVD collection. On the upside, I did discover MLP:FIM and I watched the entire first season and the first half of the second.
On top of the noise, these other students were trying to make friends with me, even though I did not agree with their lifestyle. I'm like Fluttershy sometimes...Im afraid to stand up for myself because Im afraid about what would happen next. I was afraid these students would start picking on me if I rejected their friendship, or worse. Thus, I just played along with them and said "Hi" and whatnot. The point being...I felt very uncomfortable.
It got worse. One day when I was walking up to the playhouse for class work, these random students just come by and yell at me to get my attention and they called me a name. It was dusk, and I wasn't sure if these were college kids or just middle/high school kids just picking on random people for fun. Then a few weeks later, it happened again! These kids drove up to me while I was walking to McDonalds, one reached out their hand to me as if they were going to give me something, and then they just drove off laughing. I have no idea what those kids were on or why they just decided to pick on me, but because of these incidents, I now have to keep an eye on every single car that passes me when I am walking around town doing my chores. That just further adds to my stress because to me, I can no longer trust anyone I do not know too well. I do have a lot of trustworthy friends up here, but the people I do not know greatly outnumber the ones that I do know.
Because of all this, my overall motivation to get classwork done started to sink. I do procrastinate to a degree, which I know is a personal problem of mine and I have to address, but this time, I didn't feel like doing the classwork at all. What I did get done was rather poor, and I ended up dropping one class, and failing another.
Christmas break came, and I was very excited to get out of this place Im forced to call "home", and I went back to my real home for a few weeks. I was able to get a room change for the next semester, but that required me to move up to the fourth floor of the dorm. It was away from the lobby though, so that was good to know. I was initially excited to get back up here and have another semester which hopefully would be better than the last one.
I now have been back here for nearly a month, and now, it appears that it won't be the case. For starters, I have an 8am class on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. It's a very interesting class to say the least, but when I show up, I'm sometimes not in the best of shape. The instructor was wanting to move it to Tuesday and Thursday evenings, but because only two people in the class have a job that would conflict with the schedule, he had to keep it M-W-F mornings. On top of that, I have two other classes on M-W-F, and these instructors up here are somewhat more demanding than the ones back at SGU. My morning class usually has an assignment that is usually due the next class period, only giving me less than 48 hours to get it done. So far though, the assignments have been fairly simple, but I have to work for other classes too, which would force me to learn time management. This is something I can fix on my own, but it requires more time to do so. But when you are feeling depressed because of being pressured by questionable people to be their friends, or be subjected to unwanted noise, it really takes away any motivation to do anything.
The new dorm room started out alright, like last semester, but the guys next door are into their First Person Shooter games. They have their TV up so loud the sound goes through the electrical outlet between the walls of the room, and on many nights I can hear their CoD game in my own room. The unwanted noise of gunfire really gets to me. I just want to spend time alone, in my room, without any noise or unwanted intrusions. I guess that will never happen in a place like this.
I have been thinking about dropping out of the college, and returning home before my birthday, perhaps as soon as this coming weekend. I have attended SGU before, and the classes there aren't as demanding as the ones at DSU. I have more leeway in getting my work done, which will allow me to finally get together some sort of time management system. On top of that, I will be at home, at a place where I feel comfortable. I will have family around to support me if something bad should happen.
If I do decide to go home, I will feel guilty. Guilty of abandoning my dream of graduating from DSU, and also guilty of accepting that student loan. But I think the positives will outweigh the negatives. I guess Im more suited in attending a community college rather than a state sponsored institution.
Do you think it would be a good decision to go back home where I can feel happy again?
