Making Connections 1

The biggest mixed message in college is individuality. Yes, college is a place to find yourself and shape yourself into who you want to be, but there is also a huge push to conform. Right from day one, you are put in a room with (in my case) a complete stranger. Within weeks you are saying things that they would say and you both have conformed into hybrids of each other, which isn't necessarily a bad thing. Peer pressure can also cause conformity and the most prominent form of college peer pressure involves drinking. We learn that the safest option is to not drink, but shouldn't we learn how to drink responsibly? It is almost inevitable in college. In health class we learn the alcohol content of different drinks, but in college the peer pressure to drink can often be more problematic than the drinks themselves. Sure, we learn about how we should resist peer pressure, but the topic seems to be focused more on middle school age students and tobacco. Like Meghan Daum states in her first paragraph, we don't learn enough about college in health class, even though it can be one of the most dangerous times in our young lives, as 1,400 students die annually from drinking (Sink 50). We don't often think about how influential peer pressure is in college and before you know it you are the "typical" college student. When we are transitioning from high school to college, we are told its a time to reinvent ourselves, but we aren't told that we will be forced to reinvent ourselves. College changes you whether you want it to or not.