Julia Terry

Professor Ingram

UWRT 1103

“When you see a worthy person, endeavor to emulate him. When you see an unworthy person,

then examine your inner self.” - Confuscius

In movies, college looks amazing. The main character always has friends surrounding

him or her, they go to parties, football games, and maybe even learn something here and there.

But in the end, what really matters is that they became their own person and find out what

really matters to them. In reality, or rather my reality, the only part that actually happened was

the latter, and not in the traditional sense.

Let me start by saying that what I was looking forward to in college was not the parties

and overall “freedom” that everyone gets so excited about. I was looking for a life-changing

experience where I was surrounded by like-minded, passionate, kind individuals who wanted to

make the world a better place and who wanted to better themselves intellectually. Because of

that, I went to a relatively prestigious college that is well known for having the highest amount

of medical school applicants in the US. I thought that because of this, I was going to be

enveloped by a group of people that hit all of my criteria. Well, my fairytale didn’t happen and,

instead, I got smacked in the face with reality.

While I was at this college, I was faced with a group of peers that were repulsive.

Everyone was extremely competitive, isolated, rude, and didn’t care about anyone but

themselves. I’ll start with an example. The second day of class I sat next to a new person and

introduced myself, as you do, in an attempt to make a new friend and make both of us feel

more comfortable about being in a new place with new people. She looked at my outstretched

hand, gave a small smile, and looked away. My first thought was that she was rude, but then I

realized she may not speak English very well, she may be a germaphobe, and whatever excuse I

could give myself to not be insecure. For the next three weeks or so I sat in the same spot and

so did she. We only exchanged small smiles but once I asked her if she just heard what the

professor said because I wanted to get it down in my notes. Not only did she not answer, she

even went as far as to shield her notes from me. That’s when I started noticing everything else.

It was simple, everyday things that were completely alien to the people that attended

this school: holding the door for one another, saying “excuse me” when you walk in front of

someone, not talking loudly on your cell phone in a public place, or, god forbid, have a

conversation with another freshman. No one would work with each other, people would push

others out of the way so that they could sit at the front of the class, and so many other things

that truly astounded me.

The worst part of it was when I asked the communicative people why they wanted to be

in the medical field and the responses were “because my parents expect me to,” “they make

good money,” or “I want to become famous.” While I can handle rudeness and every other

thing mentioned above, these responses tipped me over the edge. It made me believe that I

was now in a world that is purely materialistic and cold.

I tried to not be so cynical, so I looked towards the actual physicians who worked in the

college’s world-class hospital. That’s how I ended up at a roundtable with physicians and

medical students discussing what was supposed to be about children and providing healthcare

abroad. First I must tell you that my mother is a nurse. So I am used to talking about patients:

what happened to them, how it happened, how you helped them, and their disposition. So I

was expecting something similar like discussions about interesting cases the physicians had

abroad (especially involving children), inspiring stories about survivors and caregivers, how the

lack of certain supplies and abundance of others was a learning experience, and so on.

However, the whole two hours we focused on the research they had done and what they had

published. Now, research is incredibly important and it is what makes us advance, particularly

in the medical field. But the fact that all five of the physicians only talked about it and the

medical students only had questions about the research made me feel hopeless. These people

were in the field of helping others and they didn’t even talk about one human being.

I would also like to extend this overall negative picture to the majority of my professors.

I was looking forward to professors who were passionate about what they were teaching and

wanted to help young adults learn and think critically about what they were learning. However,

you could tell that many of them had never taken a teaching class before and were primarily

there for research due to how many times they referenced to it in a lecture. Even talking with

students seemed strenuous on the professor, say, if you had a particular question after class

and, therefore, they were unapproachable which added to the overall isolation. This aided in

students having the “regurgitate the facts” approach to school, and not truly learning.

Then I looked toward a place that I found comfort in during high school: clubs. Surly if I

joined a philanthropy club I would find my people, right? No. They were just as uninviting as

everything else at the school. They were basically on a grading system where, if you had the

most points compared to everyone else (which you could earn by going to the meetings,

fundraisers, etc.) then you could volunteer. It even went as far as to get into some clubs you

had to go through a “rush” not unlike the Greek system, then an interview, and finally, you

were either accepted or declined a spot in the club. Let me reiterate that these were simply

clubs.

As you can tell, I was utterly crushed. I was contemplating my life-long dream of being in

the medical field and even attending college for that matter. I realized that I even started to

emulate my peer’s mannerisms, attitudes, and overall lifestyle. So I made a very hard decision

and I withdrew from my dream school that I was ecstatic about only a few months prior.

Thankfully, when I got home things changed. The first day I arrived, I went to the

grocery store for my mom and saw a friend from high school. He told me about how his first

semester at college was amazing; he met so many people, tests were easy because he was in

great study groups, and he was thinking about becoming a political science major because the

professor’s passion for the material rubbed off on him. Then I bumped into one of the Rotary

members I knew and we talked about his trip climbing Mt. Kilimanjaro to help raise money to

end polio-- the reason he joined Rotary club in the first place. It was a passion of his because he

once had a young patient in the hospital where he used to work who had it due to not being

vaccinated. Additionally, I saw people helping a lady with her items that she accidentally

dropped; people saying “excuse me” and “sorry” when they were in someone’s way; people

with a lot of items allowing people with less items to get checked out first so that they didn’t

have to wait; and the employees who bagged the groceries helping the elderly out to their cars.

This happened all in one shopping trip!

That made me realize that the world I was in doesn’t reflect everyone. I was shocked at

people’s mannerisms at school because there are people, every day, who go out of their way to

be courteous and kind to one another regardless of if they are strangers. People truly are

loving, caring, thoughtful, passionate and so much more. I thought college was going to be all of

those wonderful things because that’s actually what does happen in most cases. I expected

more from the doctors and professors because there are many, many wonderful people in both

professions.

I realize now it hurt me because having what I consider the most important traits to

have--having passion, not being materialistic, caring deeply and being warm and open to

others--is what I am very passionate about. These traits, values, whatever you want to call

them, are what guide me though every aspect of life. So to be around all of these people who,

in my opinion, were the exact opposite, showed me that maybe everything that I thought was

important couldn’t be because of how the “real world” works. I thought that part of myself had

to be eradicated and, therefore, nothing mattered. Who would keep the door open for anyone

else if the whole point is to get your physical being through the door? Who would care about

having an intellectual conversation when learning the facts is going to get you the A+ in class?

Who cares what your profession is when it exists solely as a way for you to gain something

superficial, such as money and fame?

But I think the majority of people are better than that. However, I’ll be honest with you:

it’s something that still stands out to me like a sore thumb. It keeps me up at night wondering

why humanity is so obsessed with social media, why celebrities are cherished like they found a

cure to Ebola, or why the majority of the news is about violent acts of pure hatred. But I like to

see people’s negative traits now as truly a sore thumb, something that is different from

everything else around it, not the norm. I like to think that the things I find most valuable in life

are what others find most valuable too because, just like my ideals about college and

professionals, I had to learn it somewhere.