Oh, to be a freshman again. I remember the days when I bought every single book for all of my classes, tried my best to finish all the reading assignments, and got the phone number of every single new person I met. I still have tons of random names in my phone. This new College Freshman meme is taking me back to those days. Here’s the best of the College Freshman meme – see anything you recognize?

As I write this, I am about to embark on my final semester of my college career. Weird, right? It almost seems like yesterday when I was a little freshman moving in to my dorm. Except for the growth part, a lot has changed in these three and a half years. I’ve learned the hardships of picking the right classes and managing my social life and my studies, but it was all worth the ride. It’s cliché, but some say that college is the best four years of your life, and it’s true. They go by in the blink of an eye, so take the time to cherish your college life.

1. Make a Bucket List

While it should be on nearly all seniors’ to-do lists, making a bucket list at the beginning of your college career can help you get to know your campus a lot better. Who knows? If you accidentally stumble upon one of your campus’ landmarks, you not only knocked something off “the list”, but have a great story to go along with it. If your school has a great basketball team, sit in the student section and go to a basketball game. The student section of a sports game has its own little bubble, and that’s where all the excitement is. Whatever is on your list, don’t miss out and start making it happen.

2. Take Advantage of Campus Resources

The thing about college is that it offers a variety of resources that very few students actually take advantage of. From coffee houses with free Wifi to free entry to recreation centers, free printing, and basically anything with the word FREE next to it, be sure to snatch up these opportunities now before you have to pay for the real thing once you enter the real world. Syllabus week is the best time to get freebies from bookstores, so don’t miss out!

3. Learn How to Balance Academics and Activities

This is a pretty simple rule to follow, but sometimes, a freshman’s first semester can get a little out of hand. You’re on your own for the first time without Mom and Dad deciding your every move, so it’s up to you to determine if you’re going to that 10 a.m. class or if you’re going to go out every night. Here’s a handy tip: Go to all of your classes during syllabus week. While you should be attending them all semester long, this way, you can decide whether it’s worth dragging yourself out of bed every morning. And while it’s fun to go out, know your limits and know your deadlines. Don’t go out the night before you have an exam, and instead of pulling all-nighters and cramming, study for an hour a day until you have the material down. Studies have shown that you retain more information the longer you study. Plus, you can still have free time to do whatever else you want.

4. Go to Your Professor’s Office Hours

Like the rule before it, this is another handy tip for freshmen. If you’re stuck on an issue or don’t understand the material from lecture, go to your professor’s office hours as soon as you notice a problem. Professors have taken an hour out of their day to meet with students to help them succeed in the class, so it’s harmless to take an hour out of your day, too. Plus, if you go early on, you can get to know the professor and see what a future exam might be like, and if you take the time to meet with the professor, chances are if you’re on the border for a grade, he or she will bump you up.

5. Have Fun!

Simple and easy. The opportunity to be a young undergraduate only comes once, so live it up to the fullest!

My first day of college? Well, much of the same: ditch mom and dad after they take me downtown to eat at an expensive restaurant but don’t marvel at the used, rusted bed frame, desk and chair; shove any and all syllabi materials into a folder and go back to texting on my BlackBerry, chase down the closest seat to the cutest cutie in the room (but don’t get too close, you’ll look desperate), eat lunch surrounded by strange, potential friends and wait for my final class to end to call mom and dad.

I wish I could have pressed rewind and told my six-year-old self to remember exactly how I felt on my first day of kindergarten because 12 years later I’d be retracing my steps as a freshman in college. Reason #4353453578768 why life should come with a remote.

Unfortunately, life doesn’t come with a remote. (I mean, really, what are the Apple geniuses and Bill Gates of the world doing if they’re not inventing people-activated remotes yet!?)

So, uh, like I was saying… oh, yeah, life doesn’t come with a remote and ultimately we end up repeating a lot of the same life lessons and experiences in different contexts and locations. That being said, let’s connect the dots of kindergarten and college! I guarantee the same smooth moves you were making in your Velcro LA Gear Light-Ups you’re still making today in your slip on TOMS.

How, you may be asking yourself, does one come to know such things?

Setting aside my refined, exclusive investigative talents and my keen sense of intellect… it’s all in the playbook; the rules; The Dummies’ Guide To; The Barron’s Book of… all right there, folks.

I’m shouting out all you soon-to-be freshmen right now. The life lessons you already learned in your first few days of kindergarten you get to learn again in your first few days of college. It’s like holding the answer key to your chemistry test while retaking the exam. Bingo!

The first rule is to make a friend. Anyone. Anywhere. Now is not the time to be picky. Just pick someone. Like the days of playing in the sandbox outside Mrs. Jones’ classroom, you just need that initial human contact to get the blood flowing. Once you make a friend, you’re golden. The luxury of kindergarten is that friend might be attached to your hip all day but in college, that might not be the case. Instead, think ahead. In kindergarten it was new station, new friend, so in college just follow that same system: new class, new friend, new dorm, new friend, new lab, new friend… you get the idea, right? Chances are that by the end of your first two months of college (maybe even kindergarten, too) your initial friends will now just be acquaintances. You’ll figure your own friend circle out soon enough and you’ll coordinate when and where to meet for lunch, whether or not you have classes together and how close your dorm rooms are from one another. Until then, I’m begging you, just find a friend.

The second lesson you learn in kindergarten is partners. While in kindergarten your teacher is in charge of picking partners, on the college end you can blame (or thank) the registrar for picking your “partner.” When you’re six, your partner is the person that hangs that book-bag up next to yours, stands in line next to you, walks to and from recess with you, shares a chore with you, reads books with you and makes sure to check that you’ve pushed in your chair and cleaned off your desk. At college they’re really upping the ante with this whole partner thing. In this day and age, you actually live with your partner. Forget the three o’clock bus driving you to safety! Meet your new partner, your roommate. You will either love her, hate her or be totally indifferent toward her (a.k.a. you hate her but are trying to be above such negative language). Luckily, kindergarten and college make it possible for you to opt out of this whole partner situation. If you really don’t get along with your partner, cry. Cry, cry, cry. Your kindergarten teachers will do something to make the circumstances livable and if they can’t, they’ll give you a new partner. The Higher Up’s at college make it a little more complicated. Request a move. Talk to your R.A. And if you must, cry.

Try not to become a hysterical, sobbing mess if and when you get lost.  Kindergarteners and freshmen in college are the easiest targets to spot in a school setting because they always have that Mom-just-caught-us-with-the-lights-on look about them. As a former kindergartener (many, many moons ago) and a former freshman (in more recent history), I’ve been in your disoriented, lost and confused shoes one too many times to count. It happens to us all, even if we are too prideful and say it never did, rest assured because it definitely did. Give yourself the benefit of the doubt, college freshies, and carry a map. Or go explore campus during freshman orientation. Walk from class building to class building and try to at least familiarize yourself with your surroundings. I’d tell you to take notes on where to go, but lets face it, I didn’t and neither will you. For all you Kindergarteners out there, if you lose your way and all else fails remember this: you are a tiny, six-year-old little, harmless adorable human. Someone will find you if you are lost. But if that person takes too long, you have every right to cock your teeny, tiny head toward the clouds and wail your heart out.

“Everybody else was doing it”…. eh, not such a good excuse anymore.  If Jimmy and Tommy were throwing rocks at the girls at recess, then Johnny, that doesn’t mean it’s a good idea for you to do it, too. Bad, bad, bad idea. Even worse idea when you start throwing around phrases like cops, LSD, underage drinking, destroying school property, drawing on your R.A.’s door and flooding all the toilets on the first and third floor bathrooms. To all my future trouble makers: although it may be exciting and spur-of-the-moment because all your trouble making friends are doing it too, do yourself a favor and do it better so that you don’t get caught. Five o’clock in the morning phone calls home begging for bail money isn’t exactly the best way to get on mom and dad’s good graces.  Plus, if mom and dad find out you were in time-out, kiss Nick at Night and dessert goodbye!

This last lesson might take longer than a week for little kindergartener’s to truly get a firm grasp of but all you veteran high school folk and freshly college freshies should know this one like the back of your hand.  Get involved! Be outgoing. Try new things. You’re in a whole new place with a once in a lifetime opportunity to reinvent yourself any which way you choose. Paint with your fingers or your toes. Hell, paint with your earlobes. Don’t be afraid to join a totally outrageous club or link up with the Librarians for Literacy movement. Go for a Naked Bike Ride or dread your hair. Who cares! You’re young and fresh, man. (Get it? Get my really good play on words? No? Okay. Fine.)

After feeding your eyeballs and brains with enough knowledge to last you your first week of kindergarten and college four times over, here’s my last piece of educated advice. Spend as much time as possible doing what you love. Keep doing it. Forever. Even if it’s playing with Legos or braiding Barbie’s hair. Let your passions drive you.

Move-In Day can either be a hit or a miss. The worst part is over when you finally chuck the deuces up to your parents as they get back in the car (“Later, guys! No, I totally won’t give in to peer pressure. I’ll def study hard. Love you too!”). Trust me, missing them won’t be as bad as you think. It’s like ripping off a bandaid. Don’t do it slowly or you’ll both cry.

Now, may I be the first to remind you: just because your new friends take full advantage of the free beer and meal plan doesn’t mean you should, too. Keep that cute lil ass of yours in check!

That said, rest assured that everyone is friendly. So be outgoing, Hang out with your God-fearing RA’s rather…um…interesting roomies. Don’t freak out if you don’t instantly click with someone- you’ve got four years to make another impression. And also- this is important!- don’t be weirded out by the idea of tagging along with the crew you meet heading out at the same time as yours. Bigger crews = better fun. By doing this, you’ll make connections for next week as well!

Be prepared to introduce yourself upwards of 35 times whenever you go out. More if the music is nice and loud. Introduce yourself to the cute guy in the backyard of Phi Kappa Gamma if you’re so inclined (it works). And clubs (the school kind) are obviously great places to a) get free food that’s cooked by people instead of the machines in the dining hall and b) meet people with similar interests. Getting involved in every aspect is so much easier than you might have thought.

Waking up for class, you guessed it, sucks. If you’re smart, you will have chosen the classes that start at 10 AM or later, but if you’re one of the unlucky ones who had to fill the 7:30 class, my heart goes out to you. Stick it out, braveling.

Sit where the teacher can see you. Always have a pen in your hand. Look somewhat interested (even if you rushed out before grabbing your extra-caf iced coffee), and don’t answer questions with valley girl answers (“Tell us about yourself and why you decided to take this class, Susie Jones!” “Well, ummmm…. I don’t know? I like, needed it for a GenEd requirement? Um, I really wanna be an aaaaaactress, um…. *nervous laugh* I don’t really know what else?”). Just keep it short, sweet and matter-of-fact.

Here’s to an eye-opening blast of a first semester, fellow froshies!

Here’s something you probably already know…high school students aren’t exactly happy with their education. At least that’s what Jezebel is telling us. Apparently high school students feel like their education is not preparing them enough for college.

And frankly, I don’t blame them. Not just because I think there should be more emphasis on math and science or something like that, but because I genuinely feel that high school doesn’t do enough to prepare students for college inside and outside of the classroom. Networking? Time management? These things matter too, a lot more than AP scores or SATs.

1. Survival Skills. I’m not trying to take us back to the days of home economics, believe me. But I think there is something to be said for high schools offering their students the means to learn some basic survival skills. A few quick and easy snacks for late night studying. Some meals that can be made in the dorm room. A few basic rules for laundry room virgins. These are things college students need to know, but I’d be really surprised if any high school offered courses in them.

2. Networking Skills. Colleges put a lot of emphasis on these skills because they’re a great asset when trying to find a job, but they’re also a great asset when applying to college. Think college interviews. Meetings with advisors. Getting to know faculty parties. All those events that colleges throw with alumni and business partners who they’ve already hired from? All the people these students meet? Wouldn’t a few tips offered up in high school go a long way?

3. Computer Skills. College is about presentations and research papers, Excel spread sheets and charts and graphs. And while some colleges require students take basic computer classes, they wouldn’t need to if high school classes taught more than basic typing. I understand that resources are limited and not all schools have access to enough computers for students to learn these skills but those that do should take full advantage of them.

4. Writing Skills. Whether you’re a science major or an English major you will be spending a large chunk of your time in college writing. But more college students than we realize enter freshman year without even understanding how to cite sources properly. Research skills, writing skills, the ability to analyze an argument. These are the types of skills high school seniors should be learning in English classes. Not how to best beat that AP Lit. test.

5. Time Management. Every high school senior should be heading off to college to take this one because let’s face it, just about every high school senior needs it. In high school we didn’t really need time management skills. We went to school, did our thing, went home, did the homework we couldn’t avoid and repeated the process. Now things are just a little bit different. There’s all this free time and it seems like we should be able to get things done but five hours on Facebook go by fast. Teaching students how to organize their life, schedule their classes, and make time for school and a social life would probably be the greatest skill high school teachers could give soon to be college freshman.

Your turn. What do you wish your students had taught you about preparing for college?  

You know, Groundhog Day. The movie. You’re with me? Right. Well in Groundhog Day Murray gets to relive the same day over and over again, Groundhog Day, which wasn’t so great for him because he kept messing everything up. But still, we’re a little bit jealous. There are plenty of days in college we’d love to live over and over and over again, and never change a thing. (Editor’s Note: Or the whole thing? Please?)

Here are our top 5:

1. Your 21st Birthday. This is it. The day you’ve been waiting for. The day you take your first legal drink. The day that’s all about you. An excuse to splurge on a fabulous new, totally 21 outfit. Silly hats. Sashes. Maybe even a tiara to go with that sparkly dress? Free shots. Lots and lots of liquor. And the perfect excuse to go up to a boy and ask him if he’ll buy you a drink. The perfect excuse to do whatever you want, whenever you want to. Because nothing is a better excuse for drunken bar top dancing than “It’s my 21st birthday!” It should be noted though, powers that be, that we want to relive our 21^st birthdays, not the morning after hangovers.

2. Your First Freshman Year Brunch Recap. The first few weeks of college have been hard. You don’t really have a group of friends yet, you’ve thrown up in the bathroom twice from drinking Bartons, and you failed your first college test. And then one Sunday afternoon, you don’t remember the exact date, you ended up sitting in the dining hall for hours cracking up about last night, telling jokes, saying things like “and then I fould Liz making out with her T.A in the bathroom.” And as you eat your third helping of waffles with whipped cream (yay for dining hall health!), you realize that you finally have friends that you really like and you fit in and you love college and there’s no place you would rather be right now.

3. Homecoming. Senior Year. Homecoming is a big deal. And I’m not exactly sure why. It’s not about the game. And it’s not about the tailgating. It’s about the entire process. It’s an experience only college students will ever really understand, and its different every year. But if you have to pick one homecoming to relive over and over again, it should be the your senior year homecoming. You’ve done this enough times by now that you have your routine down perfectly, but yet you’re nostalgic enough to truly appreciate the experience. In fact, you’ll probably even manage to catch a little bit of the game that year. (Sidenote: This probably only applies if your team wins. Because the team that loses probably isn’t going to want to relive that game everyday.)

4. Classes Canceled for the First Time. Maybe it was a snow day. Or a professional holiday you forgot you had off. Or maybe your professor just unexpectedly canceled class without warning. Whatever the reason it’s still an awesome feeling, hearing your alarm go off, waking up, expecting to spend a day listening to lectures as you try not to fall asleep, only to find an e-mail informing you that your classes have been canceled. Maybe you roll back over and spend the day half sleeping, half catching up on your favorite television shows as you lounge in your pajamas and order take-out. Maybe you and your friends build a snowman. Maybe your organize your entire room or head to the beach with your friends. What you do doesn’t matter, it’s just the fact that you got to do it that feels so great.

5. Your “only at my school” day. Whether it’s Hash Bash or Winter Carnival or Mayfest or whatever your schools does, it’s the best day of year. EVERYONE you’ve ever met in college is hanging around together, drinking, smoking, laughing, talking, bringing up old memories, making you mimosas, serving free hot dogs, doing kegs and eggs, and best of all, handing out t-shirts. You don’t have a worry in the world (besides Where are my shoes?) and you’re absolutely convinced that you go to the most fun school in the entire world.

Which days would you want to relive?

Dear Tuffy Luv,
It’s my freshman year of college and I started spending a lot of time with this boy on my floor. By a lot I mean we stay up until 3 a.m almost every night talking and he comes over to my room unannounced just to hangout, he texts me on weekends after I’ve gone out to hangout, and he flirts with me on the regular. Needless to say, I like him. The only issue is he has a girlfriend. They have been dating for 2+ years and she is still in high school, a junior to be exact.

One weekend (with a little too much alcohol in my system) I told him how I felt, and he replied by telling me he liked me but was still in love with his girlfriend and he could not break up with her. Two nights later while he was intoxicated, he loudly announced to the room how attractive I was, and that he would like to spend the night in my room. We talked about both nights and he said he would rather us just be friends and forget any of our conversations about liking each other ever happened. I am not sure what to make of this. Things cooled down for a few weeks but he is starting to spend a lot of time with me again. It’s hard to think about when his girlfriend comes to visit or he goes home for the weekend.

I think I am the better fit for him right now – he is in college and needs a more mature girlfriend – but I can’t tell him that without harming our friendship so I try to be supportive. But it sucks. Should I just move on or tell him how I feel (again)?

Please help,
I Do it Better Than Her

Dear I do it better than her,
Wrong. She does it better. SHE’S the girlfriend.

And you’re…what?! Some girl he’s got a crush on. That’s it. Don’t get cute.

But, I mean, okay. I sort of agree with you in one way. You probably ARE the better fit. Like you imply, high school is a very different lifestyle than college. Besides, how many people end up with their high school sweetheart?

Well, not many. But SOME. You don’t really know what he has with her. Just sayin’.

Don’t get involved with this guy, Annoying Moniker. First of all, you do NOT need the bad karma. I mean, how serious is this (some flirting? a few texts?) that it’s worth being a homewrecker before you’ve even finished your first year of college?! Honestly. Unless you’re sure you’re gonna marry this guy, there’s no reason to get all up in this kind of bullshoop.

Secondly, how skeezy is it that this guy is flirting his ash off while he has a long-term girlfriend?! Any reason you have to think he wouldn’t turn right around and do it to you?

Cuz, um, he will.

If you feel you absolutely must, you can take one more shot at it. (ONE.) Have lunch with him or something and explain to him that you really like him but you’re not willing to be the other woman or to play games. Tell him you’d like to date him but only if he breaks up with the other girl. If he doesn’t want to break up with the other girl, that’s fine, but then he has to understand there will be absolutely no more flirting or anything of the kind.

But personally, Obnoxiously Self-Involved Moniker, I don’t think it’s worth it. There are SO many guys at college. For floop’s sake, couldn’t you just find one without a girlfriend?

Hearts & Skulls,
Tuffy Luv

Like a little pain? Get more Tough Love right here.

So her are my totally dope freshman year resolutions:

- I will become more globally aware: You guys, I know some of us (me included) set New York Times as our homepage and then, as soon as we get on the internet, our eyes glaze over at the mention of any word like “security” or “Iraq” and then we’re just like “Whateva,” and read Perez instead. Totally guilty of this. However, knowing your current global events is kind of a big deal—you always have an intelligent conversation topic to keep in your back pocket and you gain so much perspective on your own life—just how good you have it, and just how much plight really is out there. It’s easy to ignore it, but this year, I will dive into it.

- I will keep up appearances: I think I’m getting better at this overall, but this next year especially, I am vowing to stay away from the sweatpants and the not-washing-my-face-before-bed-because-I’m-too-tired excuse. Looking good helps me to access my swagger, both while doing Spanish homework and shaking my thang on the dance floor. Plus, looking good makes an impact on anyone around you—just see how intense (read: AWESOME) UBS’s dress code is for their employees in Switzerland!

- I will volunteer more: My school is in the middle of a city. Volunteer opportunities are all around me, and it’s not like I don’t have time to help out anywhere. I was so overwhelmed first semester that I didn’t really do anything and I feel like a lump of horse poop because of it. No more of that, ladies and gentleman; I will give back to the community this semester.

- I will get a job: Let’s be honest, I just need the ca$h money. Cute outfits don’t grow on trees, you know.

- I will phase out some freshman awkwardness: Whenever I’m “new,” social awkwardness is totally my thing. Sometimes I just have no idea what to say, and then I freak out that people will think I’m too serious, or too raunchy, or too whatever, and then I have even less of an idea what to say. It’s tragic, really. I need to start working harder to phase that out.

More than anything though, my brother’s friend, Time magazine writer Ishaan Tharoor, gave me ballin’ advice: Always be busy. And so that is my ultimate goal. No more floundering and loafing around for me. To (sorta) quote Disney’s Mulan—Let’s get down to business y’all.

I’ve decided recently, while lying naked in my bed after a shower (try it—it might just be the greatest thing about being home) that this break is 5% nostalgia, 25% catching some Z’s, 20% eating and 50% flat out weird.

While it’s great to see old friends and talk about that one girl in our class who got married in a hush hush courtroom wedding, or to share in on the somberness and tears of the death of our classmates’ family members, such events are not just fodder for ladies’ “let’s catch up!” sessions. More than that, they mark a tangible milestone of the passing of our high school years and the reclamation of something a bit more personal.

I’ve always held my life motto to be that I don’t take myself too seriously—and yet, maybe, taking yourself seriously is what going to college is all about. But in a different sense than what I’d ever thought about.
My good guy pal (who also decided to go to school out of state) attended our high school basketball game last weekend. To him, it was weird sitting in the college section, seeing all the high school girls clad in Ugg boots, visibly clinging to any tentacle of popularity, and all the high school guys standing chests puffed and arms crossed, the picture of hetero manliness. It was weird seeing all these doppelgangers of ourselves past adhering to the unwritten standards of our mainstream Midwest conservative high school. It was weird realizing that we were those people, just a year ago. And it was most disconcerting of all to recognize that we no longer are.

It might be more obvious to those of us who decided to forsake going to our state school, or those who went to state school, but made a group of new friends, but the constraints that once held together the social fiber of 4 (maybe more) years of our lives have become as extinct as Tyrannosaurus Rexes.

Though we’ve only left high school for 6 months, we’re already growing up. People got married. People died. People understood that there is a world wider than the halls of our high school.

Of course, there are people who don’t realize it—some of my friends, some of my former classmates in my class of 756, and even I, sometimes, have had a difficult time adjusting to life outside of those social constraints. And so, we reach back, for our glory days, for what we’re comfortable with. We sometimes transfer colleges after first semester to be with old friends. We sometimes alienate new experiences by only remembering Prom 2010. We sometimes forget what it’s like to adjust and make changes and to take our individual selves seriously.

The past can pull everyone in. Sweet nostalgia is probably more addictive than heroin. But over these first few days of winter break, when I’ve been steeped in old friends and good times and nostalgia, I’ve realized that college is the time to take your own self seriously. To forget about all the standards of high school and instead, to find what we all really want out of our own lives.

Weird that after 4 months in a college classroom learning more than I ever have in my life, it only took 4 days at home to learn the biggest lesson of all.

Margaret’s been through a lot during her first semester at college. Check out what else she’s been dealing with all semester long.

So besides information I now know about the international criminal court and how to conjugate Spanish verbs, here is some life knowledge that I’ve gained:

Do not bring a lot of t-shirts from high school: This is more of a personal issue. I have so many Class of 2010/National Honor Society/Cross Country t-shirts that I don’t know what to do with them. After assessing my clothes situation the other day, I realized that I don’t even wear those shirts since they’re irrelevant and instead, I could fill that closet space with better clothes.

If you hook up with a guy that you know, make sure you see him the next day to avoid future awkwardness: This is a tried and true method, my friends. If you don’t see him the next day, the awkwardness and overanalysis of the previous confrontation just builds up and then explodes in your face later on. By seeing him, you re-establish a chill connection immediately after the hookup and it doesn’t give you (or him) time to overanalyze and freak out.

Take fruit from the dining halls: Guys, scurvy isn’t a joke. Neither is cookie addiction. If all you have in your room is junk food, that’s all you will eat at night. However, if you have some carefully and sneakily procured fruit on your desk, you could add a little bit of healthy vitamin C to your night-snacking diet.

Don’t be afraid to take early morning classes if you love the class: Yeah, you’ll be tired, but loving the class is great incentive to wake up for it. As an added bonus, being awake longer gives you more time to accomplish stuff. And yes, catching up on old episodes of ‘Teen Mom’ counts as accomplishing something.

Work out if you’re having trouble sleeping: If you typically don’t work out and find yourself being an insomniac lately, take that step into the gym and work out a little bit. Even if it’s just walking on the treadmill for half an hour, it’ll help you get to sleep at night (not to mention help your butt look better come bikini season).

Do not depend on other people to help you with your econ homework: While this can be tempting, because doing homework together helps both of you learn more, if one person starts to slack, the other person will typically start to slack. Do your homework on your own, and if necessary, check with another person who you know is dependable.

Have bonding nights with your roommates during finals week: Finals week can be a really stressful time and you’ll see your roommates a lot less than you usually do. Take a group study break and pop in Love Actually; it’ll be better than a massage.

Hopefully I’ll remember everything that I’ve learned from this portion of my life and use it for next year and beyond, but until then, what are some life lessons you guys have learned over this semester?

Margaret’s been through a lot during her first semester at college. Check out what else she’s been dealing with all semester long.