Whether you heard it from Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Spiderman’s Uncle Ben or even this writer, with great power does indeed come great responsibilities. Being a first-time college student or a first-time Lancer from a distant land (as I was), you now hold the superpower you have been yearning for all through high school, and perhaps even through the dark days in your parents’ basement after high school: freedom from parental surveillance.
This is a brave new world, indeed.
This means no longer the ungodly 7:25 a.m. to 6:00 p.m. school days rife with application anxiety and extracurricular shenanigans. This is no longer the long nights mopping up spilled Frappuccinos and living off of breakfast sandwiches, watching reruns of “House, M.D.”
No. This is your time.
You’ve earned your way here: the idyllic small town campus with its flowing fountains and engaging faculty. This is where you might earn honors in a degree program and go on to a prestigious internship in D.C. This is where you might find lifelong fraternal friendships in a sorority or fraternity. You might even find love in someone working alongside you in one of the university’s many clubs and organizations – or just love in what you do.
In other words, you need a new game plan for a whole new life rhythm. As this is my fourth year in this community as an unconventional student, my advice here on how to beat the clock Lancer style may be unconventional. Take with plenty of salt:
• Go to all of your classes. Some senior Lancers may advise you to take a Lancer Day every now and then – a more advanced form of hooky, typically recovering from a long night out with brunch at Walker’s Diner on North Main Street. While college is indeed more of a marathon than a sprint, missing class means missing work. Missing work means more work later – work that you might not be able to make up, in time or at all. In other words, you actually save more time and energy by going to class.
• Schedule your academics first. Although Longwood in particular offers some incredible, resume-building extracurricular entities,
school should come first because you and your parents are paying for it. You are in college to graduate from college – not bleed from loans for more than four years to pursue a hobby. No one will care that you are still the president of the underwater weaving association or the King of the Buffalo Shuffle if your class has already graduated.
• Eat with your friends – some times. Although D-Hall and Farmville offer many opportunities for you to hang out and eat with your newfound friends from New Lancer Days, you may want to consider eating alone sometimes. Not only do those Bonus Dollars dwindle away faster than you think on burritos and chicken sandwiches, but eating with your friends three times a day
can take hours out of your day. No one will judge you for eating Cap’n Crunch Berries in the darkness of your Curry dorm bunk instead of at D-Hall with your half-asleep comrades before BIOL 101 at 8am.
Last words: Beat that Lancer shuffle and dominate the upcoming. You got this.
