About my **consternation** upon learning that typical college life is not necessarily particularly enlightening. College kids are Not ANY more mature, smarter, or more grown up than high school kids. I was severely dismayed to learn this fact.
I first became aware of their existence way back in my freshman year of college, good ole Fall 1998. I was actually very surprised to learn this unfortunate fact.
All my life, the TV and the teenage girls' magazines had been sermonizing that when students finally leave their comfy little cocoon of grade school and childhood, they will learn how the "real world" is. You know how people say that when students go away to college, it opens their eyes? It expands their horizons, broadens their viewpoints? The college experience supposedly makes students aware of diversity, and/or of different cognitive processes, all of which are equally valuable and special in their own unique way?
Well, let me tell you something. Attending a small private women's college mostly populated by white suburban middle-class kids certainly opened my eyes ---
It opened my eyes to just how <bland> and <uninspiring> people can be.
I absolutely do not mean to malign women's colleges in the grand concept. Back in my senior year of high school, I had also been accepted into another college, one of the leading women's colleges in the nation. That one kicked ass. I loved the atmosphere there. The current students, the potential students, the "prospects" as they called them, were all really friendly and wanted to get to know each other, probably because there was a good chance they would be classmen together. The professors that I got to know were very nice and helpful. Unfortunately, it was out-of-state, which meant that I could not qualify for state student loans. And it was private and quite expensive, and my scholarships just did not cover it all.
So I ended up attending an in-state women's college. This college turned out to be very densely populated by cutesy cheerleaders that were all English majors. The reps at this one did NOT present themselves that way when I had visited it back in high school. So I had gone in with the impression and expectation that it would be a wonderful intellectual environment wherein the students would be serious about their coursework, where the students would challenge themselves with majors and with classes that tested their academic mettle. I expected an atmosphere in which it would be exhilarating to learn from the professors.
Understand, I attended a mostly upper-middle-class-white high school, and it was an excellent environment in which to grow up. These kids were extraordinary. They were accomplished, they were intelligent, they were talented, they were motivated to succeed, they were enthusiastically preparing for their futures.
Re: the college, I honestly did not go in with any sort of chip on my shoulder against white people.
Sometimes I hear people on TV or in books describe a kid as being "just an average kid." Growing up, I truly had not been acquainted with such a specimen. Believe me when I say this: the high school I attended was leagues ahead in many categories compared to the inhabitants at the little women's lib-arts college.
I was flabbergasted at the stark contrast in atmosphere, in attitude and in general disposition, betwixt that of the high school from whence I graduated -- and the shockingly cold, apathetic, unconcerned-with-bettering-themselves-or-the-world, indifferent unfriendliness that ambushed me at the college.
It had descended upon me, lying in wait.
Whiny-ass, middle-class (emphasis on middle-class and not necessarily rich), pain-in-the-ass, racist, spoiled, pampered white kids. **Let me emphasize that these were not "rich" girls. They were distinctly, specifically middle class. And yet they still acted conceited, stuck up, racist.
Much to my shock, there were guys as well that were ____. He is the equivalent of the ___ whiny, stuck-up, anal-retentive__ (biotch.) I didn't think they existed. But now I know.
--ths was quite a shock to me for many reasons. I thought all us women were in this together. I thought there was supposed to be a strong sense of camaraderie, a sisterhood that was supposed to unite us all in this fight for equality together.
---although it did introduce me to a hilarious little list titled, "Signs you were a child of the 80s."
The reason I thought college would be a wonderful enlightening experience is that I grew up in a New England college town. It was a wonderful environment in which to grow up.
--grew up ensconced in the international graduate student society of Rhode Island.