Some things in life can only be understood through experience. College is one of them. Everyone experiences college differently, and because of that, we all end up with a fundamentally different perspective on the institution whose function in American culture is marketed as the only avenue towards a successful life. 

Career preparedness is one thing, but many agree that stories are the most important element gained from the college experience. Stories meant to be shared that portray the reality of the human condition. There are so many different stories all around you in college. You meet people who become your best friends in a week, yet once their true colors are revealed, you find them unbearable. You meet people with no concept of money because they have had the privilege of always being “comfortable,” and others who have to pretend they have money to fit in. Then you meet people who work two jobs and can still barely afford the cost of living but make it work for the promise of a better future. Sitting next to them is the student with a 2.0 GPA, who thinks college is stupid and doesn’t need to care because they have a well-paying pseudo-job set aside through familial connections. 

All along, the person who would understand you best sat three seats away in the same classes as you for two years, but you never talked to them until you had to for a group project because, after Welcome Week, there’s no time to make new friends – and who in their right mind tries to make friends in class? 

On top of trying to figure out how to become friends with people you haven’t known your whole life and protecting yourself from malicious ones, you’re constantly reminded that the decisions you make now will determine the quality of the rest of your life. This becomes comedically nonsensical when that “better life” you were promised means working the next 40 years for a company that could lay you off in an instant with a polite, dismissive and frankly dishonest “we’re sorry, but the strategic trajectory of our company has shifted.” 

This is all not to say that people are the problem, nor is the concept of higher education. College academics have undoubtedly put me in an ideal position to become successful by contemporary societal standards. I have gained valuable collaborative skills, industry awareness and honed my intuition and critical thinking and practical know-how to market myself as a valuable asset to any institution. I know how to manage my time and have ample opportunity to explore different educational and recreational interests. 

However, college fails to teach, at least explicitly, how to create for oneself. We are taught to produce work to benefit an institution that could care less about the individual and engineered to believe that this production model is the best form of living. 

My college experience has prepared me to speak up against this model. I am prepared to start my own career, fueled by the vision of a world not dependent on systemic injustice and oppressive competition, but collaborative social equity and interdependence. 

I see a world where the innate human desire to create is not only celebrated but enabled, and people are encouraged to do what they want rather than what they ought. I want to create a society not dependent on institutions, but on people. We are at a pinnacle point in history; people are beginning to question the oppressive societal structures that trap people in a system that stifles human fulfillment. 

There is a reason the U.S. is experiencing record-breaking levels of depression and general discontent with the system; however, the dominant ideology coaxes us into believing that there is nothing that can be done about it by keeping people comfortable enough to remain complacent. 

I don’t accept this idea and don’t understand why others don’t do the same. The resources are available, yet can only be achieved through shared understanding, collaboration and hope for a better future. A future that allows equal rights and equal opportunity to live a good life, not only for the privileged but for all people.