Residence life is one of the many things that can make your first year stand out from the rest. I mean, who doesn’t like meeting new people and making new friends that could still possibly be your friend in 10 or so years? Living in res really gave me good insight as to why many people consider the experience invaluable in the long run. Here are some tips for those of you going into res:

Don’t be afraid to meet new people. Strike up a conversation whenever you can. Try to make some good friends during frosh week and during the first week of classes and get to know what program everyone is in. Who knows? You might be in the same program and share similar interests! Things can easily start from sharing common interests or common backgrounds. I met many people who are in life science and who plan to take the same program as me. I still keep in touch with all of my res friends and I definitely think that my first year would have been significantly different had I not met them. If there’s a lesson to take away from this, it’s that friendships are all about making that first move and meeting new people, not just because you’re forced to, but because you want to.

Don’t be afraid of co-ed bathrooms. I’m being serious. If you don’t mind at all, you’re set. If you do, however, you might wanna get used to it soon because it’s another big part of res life. Not all of the residences are like this, but the one I was in (which was part of New College) had mostly co-ed floors. Honestly, I thought co-ed bathrooms were gonna be hard to get used to but I got used to it pretty quickly. I mean, no one really cares. Usually, when people go to the bathroom, their primary objective is to just do their business and leave. Nothing more. One more piece of advice – when using the showers, make sure you bring everything you need before you turn on the water. Seems trivial, right? Well, I thought so too until it happened to me. So yeah, heed this warning.

There’s also the constant partying, but that really depends on which residence you live in. Partying every night is definitely not good for you but, in moderation, it can be the best stress reliever! And the fact that you have other people to always hang out with makes it that much better. My room was right near the elevator, so I always heard people coming and going. While it can be distracting if you’re trying to (and just can’t) focus, it’s great if you need to take a break! (Overworking yourself is definitely something you don’t want to do since that only tires you out faster.) My neighbour who lived right across from me had a lot of parties and I would just pop by, chat with people, and chill every now and then when I couldn’t focus. I wasn’t going to get any work done with nothing coming into my head anyway, so why not relax and take a load off? And if, like me, you don’t drink, don’t worry – they aren’t gonna force you to do so.

Photo by ♥ღ~Jεnniε in ฬonԺεՐlanԺ~ღ♥

One last thing – I promise. My most important piece of advice is to KEEP YOUR ROOM CLEAN. It’s crucial that you do. First of all, it makes the cleaning peoples’ jobs a whole lot easier. They work tirelessly, so cut them some slack. Secondly, someone is bound to come and stop by your room during the year and you wanna be presentable. You wouldn’t wanna be like the guy that lived three rooms down from me. His room smelled absolutely horrible and was a mess. If you can tolerate a horrible smell, be my guest but, if you’re like me and most other people, it’s better to be safe than sorry. If I remember correctly, his room was the messiest on the entire floor and it took three people to clean and sanitize his room. If the door was open, everyone passing by could smell that atrocious stench. Finally, be organized in there. The last thing you want is to be scrambling for your lecture slides an hour before the lecture. Keep things neat and tidy and you just might make it to class early and get those good seats!

I hope this helps all of you living in res this year. If you have any comments or things you’d like to add, post a comment below.

This entry was posted on Saturday, June 25th, 2011 at 9:46 am and is filed under On Campus, Residence, UT Life. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.