Finding Community College Depressing

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AspergianRyan
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02 Apr 2013, 12:16 am

I'm in my second year of community college, and I'm just finding it even more depressing than high school. At least in high school, odds were that you'd run into a few good acquaintances or friends every day walking through the hallways, however, in community college, there are thousands of students, and I'll only run into a former classmate once or twice a week, and even then, they don't bother saying hi and they'll just focus their gaze straight ahead. There's still plenty of girls available, but I have to become more sociable than I'm comfortable with than I was in high school. The campus clubs and activities are dismal as well, today, I was interested in attending a Philosophy Club meeting, however, the activities advisor said only one person showed up earlier for it and then left. While there are a few bright, motivated students to identify with, such as former military recruits returning from tours-of-duty and career-driven high school students wanting transfer credits, my classes mostly being populated by a combination of high school slackers, late twenty-somethings, middle-aged adults and senior citizens is depressing.

I'm optimistic and hopeful that transferring to a large university will provide a more thriving environment for both socializing and career opportunities (please tell me I'm right), but being that I'm going to be at community college for three or four more semesters), I had a really sh***y first two semesters, and I'm trying to make up for the horrible grades as a result. Right now, my GPA is 2.48, before the end of the fall semester it was 1.95, so I'm making strides to bolster my GPA. Anyway, given the road to transferring to a large university, it seems like there's a distant, flickering light at the end of the tunnel, how do I try to make my situation more bearable?



thewhitrbbit
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02 Apr 2013, 10:03 am

Community college is very different from regular college.

Community college is made up of people who come to school to get classes and leave. They don't live on campus, so there's not a ton of demand for activities. Many students at CC are also working part or full time jobs.

A 4 year college has stronger clubs and activities thus more chances to socialize, but you still will have to put out the effort.



AspergianRyan
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02 Apr 2013, 12:53 pm

Right, and with that in mind that community college isn't structured rigorously for socializing in the same way as high school or a university, how do I try to make my current situation at least bearable?



AspergianRyan
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03 Apr 2013, 1:03 am

In addition to the disappointing lack of social activities on-campus, there is an autism spectrum support group that meets every two weeks on Thursdays, however, based on a picture of the group (http://www.jccc.edu/photo_stories/2012/ ... -club.html), though I don't want to make any presumptuous generalizations, it seems more geared toward the obviously-inept and weird auties/aspies, instead of somewhat more socially-adept, high-functioning aspies/auties that I would be able to identify with. Instead, I think I would find that particular support group to be sobering and depressing instead of socializing with other high-functioning aspies.

I know it might sound arrogant of me to make that generalization, and I'm sorry, but with having subtle, very mild Asperger's, I would much rather be with a group at a similar level of social functioning.



Descartes
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03 Apr 2013, 4:44 am

I don't find community college that depressing. I've gotten myself involved in many clubs and most of them have pretty strong memberships. It's through being involved with so many clubs that I've met new and interesting people and gone on new experiences. Plus, I've made a really good friend from college (who is twenty years older than I am) whom I can confide in and hang out at bars often.

I guess everybody has a different experience.


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AspergianRyan
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03 Apr 2013, 2:57 pm

Even so, don't you find the community college demographic to be somewhat toxic to your academic goals and aspirations? I.e., the slackers from high school who are stuck there for a few semesters because they couldn't get accepted into the state university straight out of high school, the middle-aged adults trying to get degrees to catch up in the workplace, and the senior citizens who are bored and have nothing better to do.



Descartes
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03 Apr 2013, 10:19 pm

AspergianRyan wrote:
Even so, don't you find the community college demographic to be somewhat toxic to your academic goals and aspirations? I.e., the slackers from high school who are stuck there for a few semesters because they couldn't get accepted into the state university straight out of high school, the middle-aged adults trying to get degrees to catch up in the workplace, and the senior citizens who are bored and have nothing better to do.


There may be some students who set less than ideal examples, but I generally don't let them influence me (at least much... :roll: ). And I actually enjoy the age diversity. One of my best friends whom I met at my community college is a lady twenty years older than I am, as I already mentioned.


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kouzoku
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04 Apr 2013, 9:03 am

I hate socializing so I enjoyed CC more than University in that regard. There were pros and cons of each. I didn't live on campus at Uni. Sharing a dorm would have been a nightmare for me.