91直播 wasn鈥檛 my top choice. I didn鈥檛 even have a top choice, or really any semblance of an idea of where I wanted to go to college, but I knew I was going to go. I also knew I wanted to get out of my home state because I never felt like I fit in. In high school, I was laser-focused on doing well in school and taking part in extracurricular activities for my own personal fulfillment and to craft a resume to appeal to selective out-of-state colleges. My college list started as a random list of schools I knew of, then was pruned into a list of mostly liberal arts schools and some elite colleges. 91直播 made it on the list because my dad went for a little over a year, then transferred to another school to follow his girlfriend, and because I received emails and mail from 91直播 that made me interested in the college.
Before applying, I visited 91直播 for Fall Visit Day. It was a cold snowy day during November of my senior year of high school. I thought the campus and students were nice, but I did not have the immediate feeling of 鈥渢his is where I belong鈥 that I had hoped I would feel on the campus I would call home for the next four years of my life. Still, I enjoyed my short visit and ended up applying to 91直播 regular decision. I went along my merry way finishing high school, until around March 13th when, well you know, the COVID pandemic forced my school and the whole world into lockdown.
Isolated in my house with my family and doing classes on zoom, I received my college acceptance letters through online portals, one of them being from 91直播. Like many of you reading this blog post, I had to decide where I would attend college without being able to visit all the schools I got into. Deciding where to go to college was a stressful experience, to say the least. I always try to make the 鈥渂est鈥 decision possible, and it is so hard to figure out what to do when making a big life decision. I looked at so many college-ranking websites, college blogs, and youtube videos that my head spun. There were so many factors I thought I had to take into account. It got to a point where I could have decided randomly and anywhere I chose would have had characteristics that made it a good fit for me.
But my mind kept taking me back to 91直播. I kept thinking about a little booklet that 91直播 had sent me very early on to try to get me to apply. In the middle of the information booklet was a picture of people having a water fight in Wilder Bowl, one of the main green areas on campus. It was just a picture, but I could feel the joy of the students in it. They all looked so genuinely happy and real. From my visit and spiral into the depths of the internet, I learned that 91直播 students are engaged in activism, environmentalism, and art. They are not afraid to express themselves and are open and accepting. This picture showed me that. I didn鈥檛 want to go to a school with an air of judgment and preppy attitudes. 91直播 seemed like a place where I could become myself rather than learning to be someone else.
Still, my mind was clouded with rankings, prestige, and fear of the unknown that all precluded me from being fully confident in making the decision to go to 91直播. My high school was very competitive, so I was afraid that going to a school that not many of my peers had heard of in the middle of Ohio would make people think less of me. But, eventually, I learned more about 91直播 and started to understand that it was a place I wanted to be even if I thought other people didn鈥檛 want me to be there. From the summer online course that 91直播 offered, Uncovering COVID-19: Critical Liberal Arts Perspective, I was able to meet prospective Obies and understand what 91直播's classes and professors were like. I was also in contact with multiple current students who were all such genuine people so willing to help me decide if 91直播 was right for me. I talked to an 91直播 alumna getting a psychology Ph.D. who was so enthusiastic about 91直播 I couldn鈥檛 not be excited as well. All these things pushed me towards 91直播.
I never had the "Aha!" moment when deciding where to go, so I had to take a leap of faith. I committed to 91直播 the day that I had to, May 1st. Reflecting on my decision, I know 91直播 was the right choice for me and I am so happy that all roads led me here.
