[Meet Margaret, a freshman at Yale. We've been checking in with her every week to see what she's doing, who she's meeting, and what new college surprises she's tackling (or freaking out about) as she embarks on the journey we call college. Or as I like to call it, the best thing since Trader Joe's Honey Greek Yogurt.]

Okay, so I am completely not a hippie. Let me just get that out there. Incense makes me sneeze, middle-of-the-forehead headbands make me look like an awkward boy and I own nothing made of hemp.

All that being said, I really do value the idea of finding inner peace and the feeling of “chillness.” So much so that one of my favorite teachers pegged me as the type who would go off to college and become one of those offbeat Bohemian types. Like Ashley Olsen.

And I clung to that idea—the idea that college would be a time for lots of self-pondering, free of nagging parents and 7 hour school days. I would ideally sit underneath a tree reading Whitman surrounded by perpetually tan Frisbee players and crooning guitar boys singing love songs aimed indirectly at me. And I would feel self-actualized and understand the deeper version of myself and be eternally fulfilled.

Well this little fantasy has turned out to be flat out false. Read More »

Say you had a million dollars.  That would be pretty cool, right?  You’d probably go shopping more than once a month.  Maybe bankroll your friends at the bar.  Pay off those student loans.  Get yourself set up in a cushy lifestyle, right?

Okay, now say you had $100 million.  You’d still do all of the above, but with the leftover change I hope you’d go all-out Oprah on some people in need.  Genocide refugees, abandoned animals, sad kids with distended bellies and flies on their faces…take your pick.  It’s really not that hard when you look at everything that’s going on in the world.

Or so I thought until one Mr. Henry Kravis proved me wrong.  The dude’s loaded.  Forget millions, his net worth is in the billions range.  And while he did recently make a significant donation, it wasn’t to the type of organization you’d expect.  Thanks to Kravis’ generosity, 100 million of his hard-earned dollars will be going to Columbia University’s Business School.  Because Ivy League universities need 450,000 feet added to their buildings and this guy really needs his name on a library or something.  Riiiight.

I’m sure the school would have gladly accepted a donation of a far lesser sum and maybe even still put his name in big stone-engraved letters somewhere.  The rest of that cool $100 mill could have fed families, bought vaccinations, or sent young girls to school.  Hell, he could have even done something as frivolous as sending a thousand sick kids to a baseball game and it would have been a better call. Read More »

Hey! Seniors out there! You guys ready for a round of twenty questions?

I am certain it has already begun for some of you. Those infamous queries – “What are you going to do?” and “What is next after graduation?” – can cause any senior to close their eyes and wish to rewind back to freshman year, even willing to regain the “freshie 15” just to avoid that Doom’s Day in May.

While applying for graduate schools and fishing through the job market almost always make a senior’s “Beyond graduation” options, a year or two of service rarely makes the list. Sure, community service like the Peace Corps and Teach for America are on the rise for recent graduates (especially with the economy struggling even more than Lindsay Lohan these days), but those only “employ” a teeny, tiny fraction of college grads each year.

Why??

Becoming a volunteer after graduation is a way to expand your worldview and options for your future, while giving you an experience that won’t soon be matched. Trust me, the stories you will have to tell will dominate any dinner conversation from this point forward.

As I am currently volunteering for a year with an organization in NYC, I know firsthand how intimidating the leap towards giving a whole 365 days worth of time and a solid salary can be. To help you discern whether or not you were made for volunteering, allow me to give you all the facts. And I mean ALL. Read More »

Fall semester is in full swing and it’s starting to feel like you’re doing the same thing every week. Class. Study. Drink. Hangover. Poor Theme Party Costume Choice. Homework. Switch things up by taking advantage of a long weekend or your fall break (if you’re that lucky) by checking out our Weekend Getaway guides.   We’ve already covered Boston and Toronto. Today we’re celebrating Austin.

Austin is somewhere I’m glad to call my home. It’s a city that’s big enough to be exciting, but at the same time small enough to be super friendly. There is always something to do here, making it an optimal destination for Fall Break or a long weekend away from campus.

Why, you ask?

Well for starters, if music is your thing, Austin is definitely the place to be. We didn’t earn the name “Live Music Capital of the World” for nothing. Secondly, we’re far enough south that “Fall” to the rest of the country still feels like summer. Have a cute swimsuit you got at an end of season sale? Bust it out here! Thirdly, the University of Texas, Austin’s major university accounting for 50,000 students, doesn’t have a fall break, so that means NO CROWDS! And, really, Austin is just all around fun. I mean, the slogan for the plethora of funky locally owned business is “Keep Austin Weird!”

If that doesn’t entice you, perhaps this will:

Read More »

On Tuesday, October 5, President Obama and Jill Biden hosted the first ever White House Summit on Community Colleges. In an attempt to draw attention to his education plan, Obama claimed, “We want to make it easier to connect students looking for jobs with businesses looking to hire. We want to help community colleges and employers create programs that match curricula in the classroom with the needs of the boardrooms.”

Due to the exceptionally high unemployment rate and our falling world ranking concerning the percentage of college-educated adults, the Obama administration feels we need to focus on community colleges to provide a more affordable education for America’s youth. Obama is looking to improve the number of college degrees by 5 million before 2020.

Undeniably, a two-year, community college education would make many students’ resumes more appealing to any future employer than having no higher education at all. However, after already shoveling over $3 billion to help low-income students at colleges with an average graduation rate of 20% (versus the 58% rate career colleges boast), Obama’s plan is far from cheap.

The move toward this plan would attempt to partner community colleges with various businesses and focus curriculum on skills necessary for students’ desired career choices, making them more appealing to said partners. The plan has received some backlash, especially from for-profit career colleges. However, all-in-all, it hasn’t received much attention. Read More »

[We scoured the country to find the ultimate sorority girl to share her sisterly expertise with you. After reading through tons of applications followed by hours Facebook-stalking all the candidates (which proved difficult thanks to FB's privacy settings....), we found her. She gave you the lowdown on rush and now that you're sitting pretty in your new house, she's moving on to more important topics: date functions.]

It seems like every year ALL the fraternities try to cram their date functions and formals into two weekends in the fall and spring. For a socialite like myself and the rest of my pledge class, juggling all these events can be a bit overwhelming for a girl! (Who am I kidding? The BF is a Pi Kappa Alpha, so unless it’s his fraternity’s function I sit on the sidelines and watch my friends get dolled up while I wish I was, too, desperately throwing together a toga!)

Speaking of toga, who doesn’t want to get asked to a fraternity date function? FINALLY you get to go to your date’s house without worrying about a drunken slew of GDI girls ruining the mood. Just you, your date, his brothers, and their dates – perfect. BUT there are plenty of ways to make the night not-so-perfect.

Everyone has had that “OMG I’m so glad I’m not that girl” moment at a party, and Greek events are definitely no exception. News travels at lightning speed through the Greek community so for your sake (and your sorority’s sake) heed my advice and don’t be that girl! And, believe it or not, ALL the things I am about to advise you NOT to do I have seen first hand. And it’s not a pretty picture. Read More »

Fall semester is in full swing and it’s starting to feel like you’re doing the same thing every week. Class. Study. Drink. Hangover. Poor Theme Party Costume Choice. Homework. Switch things up by taking advantage of a long weekend or your fall break (if you’re that lucky) by checking out our Weekend Getaway guides. You’ve already got a guide to Boston.  Today we’re celebrating Toronto.

For our readers in Eastern Canada, or even in the Northeastern states, Toronto is definitely a city you should consider checking out for a long weekend.  There is a lot to do in the city, and with everything in the downtown close together, you can see a lot in just a few days!  Plus, if you’re coming up across the border, the drinking age is only 19 so you, too, can get a taste of the stellar nightlife.

But beyond that, Toronto is one of the most multicultural cities in the world – you could easily eat or shop your way around the world in only a few hours. It’s also a hub for art, shows, and fashion so there’s something here for everyone. And your money goes a wee bit further than it would in the U.S.A.

So what are you waiting for? Grab your passport and come to Canada! Read More »

But which home is home?

We’ve been following Charlsie, a 2010 grad, on her journey through the post-grad life, from the big move to the big job hunt to the major “Is this real life?!” moments. And now, with fall in full swing, she’s got something else weighing on her mind.

Whether we want to believe it or not, the holidays are approaching. I know, it feels like summer just started – even though it really just ended – but the reality is that temperatures are dropping, leaves are starting to change, and before we know it, it’ll be time for turkey, presents, and busy shopping malls. Like many people, I’m left with the question of where to spend the holidays at.

In college, it was so black and white. For the holidays, I made the seven hour drive home to my mom’s for Thanksgiving break and winter break. My dad isn’t a big fan of celebrating the holidays, so whether he spent the season with my sister and me or not – it didn’t matter to him either way. So, when the holidays started to come up in discussion with my family, I immediately figured I’d go home to Atlanta.

But I can’t help but feel like I’m leaving someone else behind, no matter what kind of holiday location choice I make. And since plane tickets nearly cost an arm and a legs these days, it makes things even more complicated. Really, it seems impossible to please everyone. Read More »

It’s the start of a new school year and to honor that, we at CollegeCandy are bringing back the fan-favorite series, “We’ve All Been There.”  (We tried to get another national holiday/long weekend for you guys but it’s way harder than we thought so this will have to do.) Every week, Lauren – University of Michigan will comment on the common experiences all college women share – like trying to figure out if that boy is crushin’ too or stupid group projects. Read, relate, cringe and enjoy.

Your 10 page paper on the complete works of Shakespeare is due in less than a week. You vowed to spend all of Sunday at the library working on it, but an impromptu beer pong tournament broke out at your house on Saturday night and you were so busy eating Oreo Cakesters and chugging Vitaminwater that the entire day passed you by. Now it’s crunch time and you have no choice but to bang it out.

You decide not to waste any time, so you skip the long walk to the library and work at home. You tell your roommates not to bother you, lock the door to your room and settle in for some serious paper writing.

Only your desk is really messy. You can’t focus when you don’t even have space to spread out your books. So you clean it. Twenty minutes and a garbage can full of papers later, you decide to take out the trash. But before you do that, you might as well make sure there isn’t anything else that needs to be thrown away. You begin to clean your room. Once it is clean, you tell yourself, you will be able to focus. Read More »

Right before I sat down to write this I registered for the GRE. Well, actually, I registered for the GRE, opened a bag of chocolate covered cranberries (Kim Kardashian’s snack of choice), and then sat down to write this. But I digress. This was supposed to be a serious moment. Because registering for the GRE is serious business. At least, it is for me.

You see, the whole “post college plans” thing has always been a bit of a sore subject for me. What I want to do with my life, what I have always wanted to do with my life, is write. I want to write, and read, and edit, and that’s all I’ve ever really been able to come up with. But there’s no set plan for how to make that happen. Pre-Law students take the LSAT and get into law school. Pre-Med students take the MCAT and get into medical school. Business majors have the GMAT. Dentists have the DAT. And the rest of us flounder helplessly trying to either find a job or a rich husband graduate program that works for us.

Currently I’m stuck somewhere between the two. It’s why I’ve held off on registering for the GRE for so long (and why I’ve been contemplating head shots so I can join Patti Stanger’s Millionaire’s Club). I didn’t want to shell out the cash, put in the study time, and commit to the freak out if I wasn’t even going to end up at grad school next year.

But I’ve researched some programs and made some (tentative) plans and decided that even if I don’t end up at grad school next year I still want to take the GRE. I want the option. (I like options.) So I registered.

Which means I actually have to start preparing for it. Read More »