I was raised a rebel.
From being born in the middle of the 1997 Egg Bowl football game, to a childhood filled with fall Saturdays in the Grove, to sporting "Hotty Toddy" across my chest, nearly on a daily basis, my destined college of choice is the University of Mississippi. Growing up under a red and blue roof in hog country is not the simplest task, either. But, all of these aspects of my upbringing combined make me want nothing more than to attend college at Ole Miss. And this summer, I was lucky enough to do so as a rising junior in high school.
Lots of universities offer programs for high school students, but they are not near as large of programs as the Summer College for High School Students program (UMSCHS) at Ole Miss. UMSCHS has been offered for 30 years. I heard about it through my sister, who attended UMSCHS in 2006 and 2007. She then later attended Ole Miss for her undergraduate degree, and graduated from the university just two years ago. My father, and his three brothers, also attended the University of Mississippi. I could potentially add to our proud legacy of Ole Miss Rebels.
The program is a unique one. Two-hundred high school student applicants receive the privilege of living on campus and taking two college courses for a whole month of their summer. They attend these classes along with other college students, as this is during Ole Miss's summer semester. I took journalism and psychology. There were only 3-5 UMSCHS students in my classes, the other 20 being college students -- anywhere from freshmen JumpStarters to seniors taking their last class to graduate. It was quite an interesting bunch, to say the least.
My first official day of college could possibly be considered the worst day of my life, but none of it was actually contributed by the program. My cell phone randomly stopped working, I felt very sick, and my family had a health emergency all the way back in Arkansas. This is on top if the fact that I went there knowing not a single soul.
Also, I was in for a rude awakening about college classes. When they say people sleep in class, they really do. And why is that? Because nothing actually happens in a college class. The students listen to a monotone professor lecture about who-knows-what for two straight hours whilst frantically trying to write down everything on the PowerPoint slide in front of them, because they are probably going to be tested over all of it tomorrow. But this is the prime reason why I so highly recommend doing this program. Without taking 20 hours of boring college lecture classes a week for a month, how else is a high school student supposed to anticipate such a course? We are accustomed to in-class activities, field trips, worksheets, and personable teachers. Those aspects are rarely found in a college class, and I feel that high school students are not aware of this. Summer College's sole purpose is to better prepare and expose high school students to the college lifestyle, and it definitely did that for me.
Being exposed to the college lifestyle can teach you things that formal education can't. A college student faces a new life of financial management and a completely new social life.
As high school students, we are accustomed to our parents handling most of our money, and supervising our needs - they make sure we get food, sleep, etc. As a college student, you have all new responsibilities, from paying for lunch to doing your own laundry. Thanks to UMSCHS, the food equation was slightly easier, with a meal plan and an "Express" account to load with money for laundry and printing; but still, I would say taking responsibility was key. We had a set-aside plan of 21 meals and $360 in "Flex" which was also just solely applicable for food. There are several different locations on campus to get food, and it's on your time and your account to feed yourself. It honestly was not so difficult; the "Flex" idea almost made it feel like I was spending Monopoly money, but it gave students an idea of managing their funds in college. And if a student ran out of "Flex," he/she had to call up mom or dad and ask for more money, which is probably not an uncommon event in college. Again, I would say that UMSCHS achieved its goal of better preparing high school students for college with this aspect of the program.
As for the social aspect of this program, I can honestly say I have never made such good friends in a single month. A lot of it is up to the students themselves as to whether they are going to use their free time to be social or not, but the program definitely set a firm foundation for making friends. We were separated into six different "communities," where around twenty to thirty high school students were grouped with two counselors for a daily group activity. I was in Community Four. Little did I know on the first day, when we played a relatively uneventful name game, that we would ultimately be the best community ever to see the face of Summer College (excuse my overwhelming bias). In every single community-wide activity, whether it was a campus scavenger hunt or a soccer tournament, Community Four won. The determination and friendship that went into Community Four's performance every weekday led us to be the champions (And yes, at the end of it, we proudly walked together through the Walk of Champions singing). Maureen, Cooper, Emily, Leah, Aly, Charles, Zoe, Roberto, Miros, Arantza, Trey, David, Andrea, etc… my heart goes out to y'all. Although I know of some students who dreaded the required community time every weekday at 5pm, our community beautifully represented what Summer College had purposed it to be. I thank our amazing counselors, Armando and Maddie, for leading that great part of my personal experience at UMSCHS. But also, I made an unforgettable friend group, or "squad" as we called it, haha. I do not remember exactly how it formed, but about 20 of us, boys and girls, became really, really close. We spent practically every hour of free time we could hanging out, playing games and laughing in the dorm lounge or in the Grove. Even two weeks after the program has ended, my phone is constantly buzzing from our group text. And although we are spread out across the South, we have already planned several reunions in Oxford. I cannot even begin to explain the amount of hugs given and tears shed on that last day of Summer College between all of us. I have never created such a bond with people. I absolutely cannot wait to go to college just so I can get back to seeing them every day. Such sweet and silly souls they all are.
The program also provided leisure activities. Over the course of a month, we enjoyed weekends of eating out, going to the movie theater, two themed dances, going to a waterpark, touring Graceland, and shopping. Students were also allowed to be checked out by parents and go home. I did that one weekend, and let's just say I was more excited to go back to Summer College than to go home to Fayetteville in the first place. Overall, I appreciated the activities they had planned for the weekends and I think it was helpful after a long week of class.
There are so many more things I could have addressed about the most amazing month of my life that I just experienced. I can only hope that college will live up to be just as great as Summer College was, and I absolutely cannot wait for the next reunion our little "squad" has. I look forward to hopefully participating in this program again next summer. Hotty Toddy!
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