Do you want to go to University?

[Droopy]

Seems like a number off my friends are going of to University lately. For some, this means traveling everyday to another town. For others, this means moving across the country to live by themselves or with strangers. Myself, I'm due to start an "Open University" course which means I can study from home in my own comfort zone. I would eventually like to go to a normal University at some point but only if a friend goes with me as I couldn't cope on my own.

What are everyone's thoughts and/or experience of University? Is it an option for you?

 

[. . .]

My only option would be a community college. I couldn't focus in high-school due to extreme anxiety and ended up skipping a lot of the time to avoid the stress/anxiety.

I may eventually attend a community college. I wish I would have done better in high-school but I had a lot of problems at the time which wasn't my fault.

 

[CJinherPJs]

Maybe one day I would like to go to university. tbh I haven't really given it much thought but I might consider it sometime.

 

[Pinky]

i want to go to uni but its so expensive

 

[PanPaniscus]

Yeah, there's a course that's an "award" or something, I think it's slightly different to a degree but I don't know. It's at the uni in my city and it's "animal biology and convservation" and it lasts 3 years, in 3rd year you choose your own animal to study and travel to their NATURAL HABITATS and study them there. I have to do that, but I've got a long way to go qualifications wise.

 

[. . .]

i want to go to uni but its so expensive

Aspies can sometimes get financial assistance from the government.

 

[Droopy]

All of my friends and I either dropped out or got kicked out of high school.

So what are you going to do with your life (education wise)? Not to sound negative or anything, just interested. I've dropped out of normal college and my education has mainly been a disaster sue to health and other reasons. Now though, I'm going to study at home and hopefully get a few qualifications then eventually a job.

Aspies can sometimes get financial assistance from the government.

That's true. Asten, you should definitely look into getting financial support if you want to attend University. Get your parents to ask your local Citizens Advice Bureau for more info or check the website of the University to see if they offer financial support for "disabled" students.

 

[superboyian]

I don't know if I want to, I already dislike the feeling of leaving the people I know but there is a part of me where I just want to succeed.

 

[Pinky]

That's true. Asten, you should definitely look into getting financial support if you want to attend University. Get your parents to ask your local Citizens Advice Bureau for more info or check the website of the University to see if they offer financial support for "disabled" students.

ok thanks for the advice =]

 

[Balamvucub]

Good luck to You. I am going to a 'community college' and for the most parte this is going quite well. The instructors seem to appreciate people who have a 'aptitude' for learning, and the atmosphere is disiplened enough that disruption/chaos is not allowed in lab,so for me it's good.

 

[whale_bone]

I regret going to university. I love reading. I spent most of my childhood at a library. And I can get really interested in/ excited about stuff. But the whole exam/ assignments/ judging-marking just makes me get nervous and panicky, and then I lose interest and momentum because I've associated it with panicky feelings. School is NOT good for me. But I do have a few AMAZING profs, which sometimes make it all worth while.

 

[aspirejohn]

Hey Calvert,

This one's been a big issue in my life lately. I find it interesting that you said you'd want to go with friends. When I was applying for uni I ended up taking my second choice of university so that I could be where my friend was going. The problem came when he failed the first year and I hadn't made any other friends there. The second year was a lonely and dull one, and my grades started slipping because my heart just wasn't in it.

I'm on my final year now (after having been on placement for one year) and I'm quitting. I decided that the degree isn't really worth all that much to me, and it's probably not going to change my life in any drastic way by not having it. The stress and pressure of it all just isn't worth bothering with.

I know if I wanted to I could probably get a first class degree, but that's beside the point. I think experience counts for more than any degree these days. In hindsight I really would never have bothered going to uni, but I guess that's just my opinion.

 

[aspirejohn]

i want to go to uni but its so expensive

That it is. You have to weigh up the cost of going to uni with how much it's actually going to make you in the long run (and don't forget to count how much money you're not earning while you're at uni).

Unless you're really seriously interested in the subject and want to do it for your own pleasure, or you'd like to join the army as an officer, then I doubt it's worth the ???.

 

[Spinning Compass]

One of my biggest pet peeves in regards to college or university is when people talk about how they wanted to go into a certain field or career so they looked around for a school that offered it, but they never say how this education was financed.

If you are planning to go to school, I strongly recommend that the sooner you look into your financial aid options the better. And parents--you need to be with your child through this process. You need to be there in the financial aid office with the child. You need to be open and honest with your child about your finances and how college will be paid for. My parents wanted me to go to college but did none of these things. They never let me know what their income was, leaving me to face often indifferent financial aid officials on my own with inadequate information. They believed that because they were able to work their way through college in the late 1940's early 1950's that there was no reason that I shouldn't be able to do the same thing 20 years later. Never mind I had no real job skills and was ASD to boot.

If you KNOW (or suspect) that you will have to work your way through school, I would forget about the so-called college preparatory courses and concentrate on courses that will allow you to make a decent living while you are going to school. You are not going to be able to do it working for McDonalds. In fact, I will be honest with you, the odds are really stacked against you succeeding if you have to work your way through school. Also, I would find out beforehand, what the unemployment laws in your area are concerning students. I learned the hard way that because I was taking classes it made me ineligible to receive unemployment when I was laid off. Trust me, you don't want to be in that situation. I also learned that it does not pay to be honest with people and that sometimes you have to lie or at least do not volunteer information.

When I was turned down for unemployment even though I was only a part-time student (the reason they gave for denying me was that I wasn't available 24/7 for work), I said to the clerk, "All my life I have been told that if I work hard, go to school, and pay my dues, I will be rewarded. But you are telling me that if I did nothing but sit on my fat ass all day and pump out baby after baby, I could get all kinds of help." She did not deny the truth of it. This, my friends, is what you are up against if you try to improve yourself and don't have access to the kind of money you need. And then people wonder why we have problems in the inner city.

 

[LgndKllr24]

I went to college but it took me over five years to graduate because of problems I had, both ones that were my doing and ones that were out of my control. I don't really regret doing it, however when I graduated it did feel at times like it was for nothing because I had a hard time finding a job. The job I did end up getting was one that didn't pay a whole lot and you didn't necessarily even need a college degree for. I think having a college education is important, but having work experience is even more important. Having them both is when you are really made though. For the most part, I look back on my college years pretty fondly. I was lucky enough to meet a few people I got along well with and I actually lived with them for most of the time I was there. They were all pretty cool.

 

[oskarandri]

Damn right i'm goin' to college, i'm going to become a physician and i'm going to do whatever it takes to become one!

 

[WildCat]

If only I had the time and money, I would have been working towards my bachelor's by now. My goal is to get into the IT field, maybe game design if it wasn't so damn competitive and expensive. I know there are plenty of 2 year programs or certificates or whatever one could obtain, but I don't know if I can balance a full time job and an education right now.

 

[Geordie]

I did not ever want to go university initially. My high grades said it all, I am a 'B' student despite working so hard in my studies. I see that I am not that special with my academic work.

But I am still in university, and hopefully things can turn out to be well.

 

[Occasional_Demon]

I guess for me, it wasn't so much whether or not I wanted to go when I was a kid - it was expected OF me to go to university. Not only to university, but to the most prestigious university in my area. So, I guess it was always ingrained in me that I was going to go to university after high school, and I never really paid much thought into whether I actually wanted to go to university in the first place [btw, I did make it into said university].

With my current degree, I made the conscious decision to both change my course and my university.

I think living in Australia, I've been lucky in that I can put off paying for my student fees until after I come out into the workforce. I've also made some repayments here and there, and education here is far more affordable than say, the US.

 

[Geordie]

I personally still don't get it when some people emphasize so much in 'prestige' in 'education'.

I am speaking this as a student who enjoys studying, but manage to get only 'B's - because I often get involved in school activities (which I am often just a happy participant, which does not actually distinguish me from the rest of my class) and my style of critical thinking is not really appreciated, imo, and that I enjoy the other finer aspects of life.

I don't think prestige alone can help with personal development, unless one wants to work for the government/government-linked programs (which tends to recognize only a few universities for applications for its highest posts) or are members of the global social elite, which recognizes only Oxbridge, HYP and the likes.

I am particularly dumbfolded by the phenomenon of youngsters in my country trying to crack into a local uni called 'National University of Singapore'. Yes, it's government-funded. And yes, it's recognized by global rankings as a 'global university', so great that Southeast Asian tycoons decide to send their children there. But then, most of us won't be 'elites' - it 'sucks' to lose to other people in a race they've got a high chance to lose, like the race to join in a new class of 'elite'. And by joining the race, they have a high probability of losing their unique thinking and personalities - which I witnessed in the past few years, some of my friends who went there, indeed do lose their unique selves for some reason or other.

Having more choices, I'd just give up getting into a local university (restricted by artificial admission quotas for local people in my country) and start saving for work, before going to college elsewhere, where I can seem to study for the sake of the love of studying.