Deciding which college to attend is hard enough as it is. A lot of factors go into this process. Nowadays, seniors in high school use social media to get information on a college as a whole. While this may sound like a good strategy, it can also leave incoming freshmen overwhelmed with pressure on which college they think will be the perfect fit for them.
No college can be perfect because everyone has a different preference. That being said, social media is a great way for people to determine what type of college they want to attend by providing endless content and information about each college. This is a disadvantage because it’s not an accurate reflection of what the college is like. College students will post about game days, tailgates, and other typical college events that look undeniably fun. However, is that all that college is about?
Some students may be compelled to go to a school just because it “looks fun.” That could very well be true, and of course, college should be a fun experience, but making this big of a decision shouldn’t be based on how a school is portrayed on social media. Twenty years ago or so, students weren’t given the luxury of looking up a college on the internet and getting an idea of what it would be like there. Sure, this could be a disadvantage, but it also seemed to be less stressful. Enrolling into a college with barely any knowledge of it seems a lot easier than finding out more about college through social media. This could make a student overthink their decision and feel influenced by factors that they wouldn’t have felt if it wasn’t for social media. Of course, times have changed since 20 years ago and so have the colleges, but it is evident that social media is what has influenced this change the most.
Sure, social media is beneficial for finding a roommate, but back then students were given a sheet to fill out and describe themselves, what they like to do, and so forth. From then on, they were matched with another student with whom they appeared to be most compatible and that would be the person they lived with for a whole school year. Although this system seems less sophisticated, it did work and caused less stress for students back then.
Today, it’s a lot more complicated than that. Students can put together an Instagram post that consists of pictures that represent them well, social media usernames, and a caption introducing themselves and what they like to do. That way, other students planning to attend the same college can reach out to them and get to know each other before deciding if they want to room together. The reason this could get complicated is because social media is known for being fake. A person could appear a lot different on their social media than in person. The ability to determine whether or not that’s the case for someone you might want to room with can be very difficult.
Overall, students today are given more exposure to college beforehand which is leading them to overthink this process entirely. It also raises unrealistic expectations for the college experience as a whole by only showing things like football games, fraternities, and sororities.